Innholdsfortegnelse for Fall 2021 - Fall Special 100 Year Anniversary Issue i L'OFFICIEL USA

Alessandra CODINHA WRITER “The Eyes Have It” “Jessica Chastain is one of those actors who is so good at her job that it’s easy to forget how hard the work she’s doing actually is. I was moved by the generosity of spirit she showed towards everything, from her co-stars and the characters she plays to the clothes that she wears.” Jermaine DALEY STYLIST “To the Nineties” “I viewed my favorite collections through the lens of cool ‘90s minimalism, highlighting the luxe velvets of Gucci, the neutral palette of Fendi, and the structured silhouettes of Bottega, whose looks best Illuminated that aesthetic.” Amanda HARLECH STYLIST “Time Traveler” “‘Time present and time past / Are both perhaps present in time future / And time future contained in time past’–T.S. Eliot Matt TYRNAUER…

Fine jewelry has long drawn its prestige from the versatility of the unique pieces that lavish on the crowned heads and great figures of high society. This centuries-old tradition, common since the 1800s, has its origins in a double necessity. First, a very practical one: The need to make the most of rare stones at a time when most modern mines had not yet been discovered. These stones were often passed down through generations. The jewelers’ role was to transform the original jewels to the tastes of the day; it was not uncommon for a tiara to morph into a necklace over the course of its ownership. The other need arises from new social mores of discretion. Clasps disappeared and chatelaines cleverly concealed watches that can be looked at tactfully.…

Fashion magazines demand to be judged by their covers. A mysterious alchemy of glossy photography, inspired styling, and graphic design that somehow perfectly captures the zeitgeist, the magazine cover is at once timeless and also a precise reflection of right now. The fashion magazine—so often erroneously seen as merely superficial—is a significant window into the current cultural mood. Throughout its storied 100 years of publication, L’OFFICIEL has produced more than 1,000 covers that, when viewed together, are a crash course not just in the history of fashion but also our modern moment. As each decade develops its own unique stylistic personality—drawing on fashion trends from previous cycles while forever searching for what’s new, and always reflecting shifts in social attitudes—L’OFFICIEL’s covers, issue by issue, build a framework through which to…

Renowned fashion illustrator René Gruau was one of the most significant figures to leave his mark on the pages of L’OFFICIEL. Often drawing comparisons to the great French artist Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Gruau’s Japonisme-inspired use of color and commanding sense of line transformed the fashion image, evoking the elegance and high style of the couture-dominated era. Gruau’s collaborations with L’OFFICIEL spanned more than 55 years, throughout which he illustrated 11 covers and countless spreads. His first cover for L’OFFICIEL was published in 1947, and effortlessly captured a moment when Haute Couture was experiencing a post-war surge of newness, sparking a lifelong connection between the illustrator and the elegance of French couture. Born in 1909 to an Italian nobleman father and an aristocratic French mother, Gruau was originally the Conte Renato…

Since 1981, Emporio Armani has been an innovator. Giorgio Armani’s collection dedicated to younger audiences has changed with the times, all the while staying true to its values of inclusion. The brand’s Fall/Winter 2021 show, aptly named “In The Mood For Pop,” is not only a celebration of the 40th anniversary of Emporio Armani, but also of the 1980s themselves. This mix of elegance and androgyny is apparent in the collection. Oversized suiting in relaxed silhouettes are nostalgic and sexy, harkening back to familiar trends of the decade with a modern take. The clothing is shared across the gender spectrum: pleated high-waisted trousers are paired with velvet jackets, while graphic prints and knit details punctuate the looks. The pieces in the collection are meant to be taken to the streets,…

On social media, artist Lucy Bull’s landscapes read like tunedup Impressionism with shades of Mark Bradford. Or maybe late Monet lily pads on acid. In person, there is something more sinister going on. Bull’s psychedelic paintings hiss and vibrate like Bridget Riley stripes on a hot sidewalk. They dominate the room with a ferocious joy. The same could be said of Bull, who at 31 is a fixture of the Los Angeles art scene, a position she held long before her recent sold-out solo debut at the David Kordansky gallery, and one that extends out past the purview of the artist. Her beloved eponymous desk gallery, which she runs out of her house in Echo Park, is infamous for turning exhibitions into all-night parties, which Bull doesn’t mind, but she…

Despite the close attention it’s paid on the red carpet, fashion, for a celebrity, is typically fairly disconnected from a star’s real interior world. For the chameleonic actor Jessica Chastain, though, fashion is elemental: a true pleasure that is both a vehicle for self-expression and an opportunity for inward expansion. Fashion is like music, she says one morning this summer. It’s an art that doubles as a tool she can use. “It constantly makes me feel different things,” she says. “It opens up other parts of myself.” It’s this perspective—along with the kind of exquisite bone structure that belongs as much in Old Hollywood as it does new—that made Chastain the natural choice to pose in decades-spanning designs for the Centennial Issue of L’OFFICIEL. Anniversaries were on her mind, too,…

I moved recently to a house in a canyon in Los Angeles, which is similar in its situation to the house in which I grew up in a neighboring foothill section of the city. Like the house my parents had, this property has views on to nearby canyon ridges. It is all quite picturesque in these canyons—as well as voyeuristic—because of views on to the backs of other canyon homes, framed by tall trees. In the distance—after dusk—there are city lights; in the foreground, coyotes. Overhead, in the L.A. canyons, with surprising frequency, there is the thunder of police helicopters. As I have not lived in an L.A. canyon for some years, the effect of returning is Proustian, being back above the city I live in, where I am from,…

CONNER IVES, USA Conner Ives has captured his ideal of The American Dream in his collection of the same name. Ives’ graduate collection from Central Saint Martins takes inspiration from the women he grew up around in Bedford, New York. From “The L.A. Crystal Girl” to “The Valedictorian,” these archetypes form a picture of 2010s Americana. The designer maneuvers vintage fabrics and recycled clothes into new pieces in a process he calls “Reconstituting,” exemplifying the Gen Z mentality emphasizing sustainability. CASSEY GAN, Malaysia The chemical-engineer-turned-fashion-designer Cassey Gan is no typical creator. After realizing her true passions in the fashion industry, Gan studied design at London College of Fashion before eventually starting her own brand in 2014. With a focus on joyful prints and bold color, Gan’s goal is to empower…

1920s–1940s According to writer and Parisian nightlife aficionado Maurice Sachs, the first dance halls opened in Paris one hundred years ago, in 1921. During the First World War, social evenings and dances were not considered proper for young women to attend, but it wasn’t long before the nightclub made its appearance. Up until that point, popular balls were held in Montmartre or Montparnasse for the bourgeois and aristocrats, but the dance hall ushered in a new era in which women could safely venture out alone and with no judgment. Sachs writes in The Decade of Illusion: Paris 1918-1928: “A real dance hall has red lacquered walls, orange and blue lanterns; chiaroscuro and hurried hands; on the left, tango orchestra, on the right, a jazz band: piano, trombone, saxophone, drums, and…