Haute Couture
Haute couture need not be confined solely to the rich and privileged, says Liam O’Brien, it is also art in its own right.
There are many misconceptions about haute couture. These either stem from the belief that everything modelled on the catwalk is classed as haute couture, or the opinion that the lavish dramatic displays featuring unwearable clothes are a testament to the delusion of the fashion world.
Haute couture is actually a legal term, with only 13 fashion houses (10 of which are French) currently operating under its label. Of these only around seven regularly show. The reason for this is the sheer expense that a couture collection creates for a fashion house and the time constraints of producing, in Dior’s case, 13 collections per year for women alone. Though Dior, Chanel, Armani, Valentino and Jean Paul Gaultier all show two haute couture collections a year, the term’s relevance is tested when one considers that the most notorious trend-setting Italian houses - Prada, Dolce and Gabbana and Balenciaga - all simply use less expensive, ready-to-wear collections to showcase cutting-edge design. Despite once being a couture house, Versace now follows the majority of Italian houses, finding the archaic regulations associated with haute couture too prohibitive. Couture, however, still stands in the minds of most fashion media, from Vogue to the younger. trendier i-D, as the ultimate showcase of an atelier’s talent, and the closest fashion comes to being living, walking art.
Discomfortingly, the beauty of these biannual collections is underpinned by constraints that might sit uneasily with those who have a romantic view of the fashion world. Only a select few can afford couture pieces. Consequentially it becomes a purchase for the sickeningly rich rather than the fashion-forward. At times the collections serve the expectations of a house’s mere 100 or so couture customers. There’s always a plethora of suits from Chanel and minor variations of the same dress from Armani Privé. This may appear strange, given that the houses rarely make money from couture collections, so essentially what they pay for is the loyalty of influential women in the hope that it generates profit elsewhere. The process which decides who occupies the front row is the product of years of sustained, deadly serious fashion in-jokery, and even to most of those interested in fashion the haute couture catwalks are something of an elevated farce. The strict controls under which garments are made and the remarkable products which emerge don’t give it social relevance, or even justify it as a high society construct. It is only when viewed as pure spectacle that it holds any significance.
Couture is a welcome diversion from the moribund trash that Topshop and other high street stores have begun to slap on the catwalk. Because it’s completely removed from real life there is no need to worry about obtaining it, wearing it or being put on a waiting list to buy it. Looking through pictures of couture collections, a habit that constitutes the extent of most people’s involvement in haute couture, is a pleasure that remedies the stress of the bland ensembles we put on everyday. Perhaps this is because the element of choice is removed and we can simply indulge in a thoughtless aesthetic fantasy.
When thought is required of us by the designer, the conceptual transparency is often hilarious. Dior by John Galliano is perhaps the most anticipated show of all, and each year he painstakingly researches a theme for his exhibition to revolve around. A few years ago, this theme was Marie Antoinette, a conceptual Aladdin’s cave. What resulted was some white dresses with blood on them. Last autumn, it was historical figures, so out came the wonderfully crafted outfits so heavy that the models had to boot the wooden frames holding them up and down the catwalk and then stop for a breather. And what was the fashion world’s reaction to these fantastic absurdities? People were reported to have cried at their beauty.
Criticism of couture is inevitable but pointless. No, it doesn’t work financially, and it doesn’t set the trends anymore (that is now the perogative of Italian and Japanese houses). What it does do is to amalgamate the skills of ateliers, make-up artists, photographers, writers, models and marry them with the vision of a designer. The purpose of couture is not to create an image to sell perfumes or bags as some believe. Its purpose is to explode through the rigidity of normal fashion; it’s art in a different frame.
