From Riccardo Tisci’s first ready-to-wear collection for Burberry in London, to the announcement of Michael Kors acquiring Versace, Spring/Summer 2019 has been a season of new beginnings for major fashion houses. But there was one event in particular that stole the spotlight before it even occurred: Hedi Slimane’s debut as the head of Celine. The show took place at the end of last week at Les Invalides: 96 looks in the cold light of revolving mirrors — a paragon of the signature style Slimane has finessed during 20 years of his career. We were promised new beginnings — but there was an uncomfortable feeling that the industry is only creating an illusion of change, while inherently remaining a game of endless repetition with only a handful of characters. Appointments of big designers at big houses make headlines — but in the clash between the brand identities and designers’ egos, is there a place for truly moving forward?
Following a 2 year break from his departure from Saint Laurent, Slimane was appointed as artistic director of Celine in January 2018, taking over from Phoebe Philo. And it was clear from the get-go that Slimane was not keen on delving into the brand’s archive. Firstly, he deleted the brand’s official Instagram account. And secondly, in a move that’s been ridiculed by internet fashion disciples, he changed the logo, dropping the accent over the e — and so Céline became Celine. The posters for the new campaign were plastered over every European fashion city, with photos of gold foil curtains and Slimane’s signature black and white portraiture.
On the runway, we saw a familiar Hedi Slimane, the man the fashion world knows from Dior and Saint Laurent: the hedonist throwing an never-ending party for pretty kids and rock royalty, an array of skinny suits, skinny ties and skinny legs, all black everything (except in diversity casting), ankle boots, biker jackets and boxy coats. Celine femininity by Slimane was a complete fantasy: thin and white Chateau Marmont princesses in veils, fur coats and tight sequinned dresses. This fantasy will undoubtedly sell, but its appearance under the label of Celine is problematic. Slimane inherited his post from Philo, and his aggressive erasure of the label’s recent past suddenly felt like an attack on everything her design approach stood for — on the rise of female gaze in fashion and one of the biggest shifts in the 21st century woman’s wardrobe.
Celine was founded in 1945 by Céline Vipiana and has been owned by the LVMH group since 1996. Michael Kors was a creative director from 1997 to 2004. But Celine as we know it today is the direct product of Philo, who redefined the brand in her 10 year reign from 2008 to 2018, alongside CEO Marco Gobetti who has now moved to Burberry. Philo created the “Celine way” of dressing: hair tucked into a turtleneck sweater, perfect tailored trousers paired with simple white sneakers, camel coats, such memorable designs as fine leather T-shirts and fur-lined slippers. It’s intelligent, intellectual and, crucially, comfortable. It was created for contemporary women who have to juggle career, family, and the world’s inevitabilities. Of course, with its high price point, Celine was not for everyone, but the ethos was truly expansive — it influenced how women dressed in every big city, in every office. Phoebe Philo was a symbol of womenswear created by a woman for other women — an idea so simple yet still so revolutionary.
Of course, in 2018 femininity comes in many forms, and there’s nothing’s wrong with tight sequinned dresses — but there was something truly uncanny in Hedi Slimane’s Celine vision. It echoed the anonymous and homogenous idea of a woman shaped by the male gaze and celebrity culture. Slimane is faithful to his style but unchanged for two decades, today it has the potential to become toxic. The Celine show happened the same day as the Ford-Kavanaugh hearing was all over international headlines. The New Yorker called the scandal “a grotesque display of patriarchal resentment,” and while writer Max Lakin admits that we have a tendency to find patterns in unrelated information, he wrote in a tweet last week, “it’s hard not to see the parallels between Hedi and the GOP: men adamant in giving power to other men; a wholesale rejection of the opinions of female constituents; a baldly sneering, vindictive disdain of women.”
Ultimately, LVMH’s appointment of Hedi Slimane to Celine was a business move. After all, he took Saint Laurent from the revenue of 400 million euros to 1 billion. But has the system worked in this case? So stone cold dedicated to his style, maybe Slimane should just have his own label which would satisfy his substantial fanbase? How is the consumer going to choose between the new Celine and Anthony Vaccarello’s Saint Laurent which has ultimately inherited the same codes? Is there a difference between sticking to your guns and failing a reality check (let’s refer to the case of Raf Simons who showed masterful, authentic yet very diverse work at Dior and at Calvin Klein)?
In the end, Hedi Slimane’s vision has its own niche and its own customer — but last week it felt severely mistimed ad misplaces. It shouldn’t have been called Celine, and perhaps it shouldn’t have been the highlight of Paris Fashion Week in the year 2018.