24 Jan

After Men Fashion Week it is time for Haute Couture. Schiaparelli has opened yesterday the Haute Couture Week in Paris with a surreal collection for Spring-Summer 2023 entitled INFERNO, inspired by Dante Alllighieri’s poem.

At Le Petit Palais, Daniel Roseberry demonstrated one more time his well-earned place in fashion as avant-garde couturier with his latest Haute Couture avant-garde, artistic and shocking collection for Schiaparelli.

And having as a point of inspiration the work of Dante, the entire show itself presenting the designs was indeed a real time poem.

“We all know this work, by name if not by heart. And yet when I revisited it recently, I was struck by something I’d missed when I first encountered it—not the horror of hell that Dante conjures so vividly, nor the sense of despair that overcomes you as you descend further and further into the realm—but by how the story is, at its core, an allegory of doubt.

The narrator, Dante’s stand-in (also named Dante), is almost exactly middle-aged at the narrative’s beginning, when he finds himself “midway upon the journey of our life.” And yet as he climbs deeper into hell, he realizes just how little he actually knows—all those years, all that life, and yet he remains in that “dark wood,” the path he had once walked so surely vanished from sight.” (source: Schiaparelli)

The surrealist looks worn by models are dedicated to the beauty of nature so that the looks are completed with oversized representations of sculpted animal heads made by hand with foam, resin and other artifical materials. Although the purpose is to celebrate the fastuosity and pure beauty of the animal world the social media is presently being divided as reactions towards the animal representing looks.

Model Shalom Harlow represents the loin, a rare white leopard, Irina Shayk is the lion, while the black she-wolf and her orange eyes turn into a long-haired coat that wraps around Naomi Campbell.

In these dresses, nothing is as it seems. “In addition to evoking the organization of Dante’s literary universe, with three looks for each of the nine circles of hell, I was also directly inspired by some of his most compelling images,” said Roseberry.

“Hell, Purgatory, Heaven: one cannot exist without the other,” writes Roseberry. “We are reminded that there is no heaven without hell, no joy without pain, no ecstasy of creation without the torture of doubt. My prayer for my self is that I remember always that, on my most difficult days, when inspiration just won’t come, no ascension to heaven is possible without a first trip into fire, together with the fear that comes with it. Let me embrace it always.” ( quote by Daniel Roseberry)

Some of the prestigious guests present in front row contribute to giving life to this imagery, including Kylie Jenner who makes her entrée by dubbing the dress worn by Irina Shayk with the lion’s head framed on the bust like a trophy.

Among the other stars sitting in the front row also Diane Kruger, Rossy De Palma and Chiara Ferragni, fresh from the announcement that she will dress Schiaparelli at the Sanremo Festival.

While rapper Doja Cat was the sensation of the public with a red head-to-toe sublime red look fully covered in 30.000 Swarovski crystals by make-up artist Pat McGrath just perfect to high-light the luxurious, untouchable and amazingness essence of Schiaparelli.