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Louis Vuitton's 'blow up' show caps energetic season at Paris Fashion Week

The funfair lights at the show shone as brightly as the star-studded front row for the vibrant and infectious spring collection by artistic director Nicolas Ghesquiere.

Louis Vuitton's 'blow up' show caps energetic season at Paris Fashion Week

Louis Vuitton spring summer 2023 womenswear collection at Paris Fashion Week. (Photo: AP)

The funfair lights at Louis Vuitton shone as brightly as the starry front row Tuesday (Oct 4) for the vibrant and infectious spring collection from Nicolas Ghesquiere that capped Paris Fashion Week.

Dramatic bursts from a tribal drum echoed across the storied cobbles of the Louvre, leading guests to a surreal world of circus mirrors, Las Vegas lights and myriad lattices of tent-like red latex – where clothes were blown up.

Louis Vuitton spring summer 2023 womenswear collection at Paris Fashion Week. (Photo: AP)

HONEY, I SHRUNK THE MODELS

Louis Vuitton spring summer 2023 womenswear collection at Paris Fashion Week. (Photo: AFP)

If Nicolas Ghesquiere raised excitement with the circus-like set that curved like a theater in the round, the fun designs did not disappoint.

This season, the 51-year-old Louis Vuitton designer let his childhood imagination run wild with the theme of blowing up.

Louis Vuitton spring summer 2023 womenswear collection at Paris Fashion Week. (Photo: AFP)
Giant zippers accompanied even bigger Monogram "hand"-bags, humongous bow collars, clown-like buttons and enormous unfurling leather sections that evoked the hit movie Honey I Shrunk The Kids.

Beyond the obvious gimmicks, there were some accomplished looks in the colourful and youthful collection that was also a playful, contemporary take on regal dress.

Blown up Elizabethan collars – or were they lifebuoys? – were given a sporty revamp on loose, ruched gowns and black stomping boots. Elsewhere, the Renaissance collar silhouette traveled down the body playfully on another look at hip level.

There was method in the madness – the designs' sheer vibrancy giving a coherence to the collection as a whole.

Ghesquiere perhaps went too far with a leather print series of blown-up zippers, but stand out pieces like an embroidered multicolored apron dress surely made up for it.

THE STARS OF LV

Pop icon Janet Jackson looked the model of calm as the cameras jostled around her inside the former royal palace's oldest courtyard, the Cour Carre, amid the dazzling set lights.

Jennifer Connelly breezed through backstage. Lea Seydoux posed for photographers near fashion's richest CEO, Bernard Arnault of LVMH, and House of the Dragon star Milly Alcock soaked up her new-found fame – a recent addition to the front row crowd. The Australian actress who played childhood Princess Rhaenyra did not forget her humour, lamenting it was "terrible" that her character had to grow up and she be replaced in the hit prequel.

There were so many celebrities that some bewildered fashion journalists just sat down, beaten, with their VIP cheatsheet on their lap.

High-octane scenes like these are the norm at Louis Vuitton – which since Karl Lagerfeld's death at Chanel has become the undisputed highlight of Paris ready-to-wear's final day. It's a glamourous bookend to the entire fashion season that travels through New York, London and Milan and always ends in the City of Light.

Source: AP/yy

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