Chloé’s Rave-Inspired Metallic Eye Takes Less Than a Minute to Re-create

“Fusion energy rave culture” is how Gabriela Hearst described the scene she created for today’s Chloé show. “It moves the stars; it moves you,” she explained of the solar power system that radiates from the sun and stars. In her interpretation (and rumored IRL rave research), a party-hard Parisian iconoclast character came to life inside the Pavillon Vendôme. Rather than the barely there beauty that’s become synonymous with the label, silver DIY painted lids and slicked-forward side parts played off lipstick red leather dresses, biker-chic jackets, and hot shorts.

Upon entering backstage through an enormous bank vault, you were greeted by a wall of inspiration images that included sweaty dancing clubgoers in tube tops, Christie Turlington’s wet-look hair, couples making out, and ultra-platform high-tops. Nearby, Tata Harper had a line of models in white bathrobes waiting to receive her now famous “glowy Chloé” complexions. This time, her new Superkind collection (which she said “has probably the most radical technology of all” thanks to extremophile ingredients like the desert rose of Jericho) was working its magic. “The models’ skin is so deflated when they come to us,” Harper said of what she’s come to expect on this last leg of fashion month. She called the Fortifying Moisturizer a hero for its ability to “improve moisture cushion and retention by 71%” in 24 hours or less. Observing the models getting prepped, it appeared to work instantaneously.

In Holli Smith’s chair, Angel Prost sat as the hairstylist smoothed Carol’s Daughter Healthy Hair Butter through the lower half of her bleached lengths. “Honestly, they just rereleased it—you’re only allowed to buy five at a time,” Smith said of the cult-favorite product, which is regularly sold out. It’s Smith’s solution for creating a slick style with ends that move with the beat. On top, Oribe Volumista gripped hair into a side-parted bang that looked so cool, there were already discussions of re-creating it for the after-party. The products, combined, created a “tight” look with “more edge” than floofy, volumized, extension-enhanced hair (continuing the thin-hair revival that started on New York’s Eckhaus Latta runway). Some models had center parts, and some had braids—and according to Smith, “side parts need to be reexamined.” Today she proved that flipping around your style and mixing it up can be the best way to extend a cut. “What I’m trying to do is show how you play with a look—people don’t know how to do that because we’ve been in this raw zone for five years of naturalness, or they get the cut, they get the color, they have extensions, and they never think to play with it.” Treat hair like makeup, she said, and try something for a night out. 

And doing exactly that, makeup artist Hannah Murray delivered DIY “extreme silver eye paint” transformations, which turned the old-school Chloé aesthetic on its head. What’s more is that the look can be accomplished in no time at all. “It takes two seconds and needs to feel like they’ve done it themselves,” Murray said of the swipes of unbranded silver theatrical paint that she pressed into the inner corners of eyes and swiped onto the outer edges. “There’s a hint of rebelliousness and toughness,” she said. (There’s also an abstract painting moment happening in Paris, with models at Anne Isabella in silver eye makeup that read like a sheer mask, as well as chalk white scatters across faces at Caroline Hu.) To chill out icy blondes even more, Murray bleached their eyebrows; eight models got a grungier, night-after-the-party silver eye; and others, like South Sudanese model Bigoa, received glossy lids. Everyone, though, had a strobe cream base of Bobbi Brown Bare Glow Extra Illuminating Moisture Balm to perfect skin, while no one wore mascara, Murray noted—because “that would make it too pretty.”