Pressiat RTW Spring 2023

Inspired by a fictional meeting between Iggy Pop and Marilyn Monroe, Vincent Garnier Pressiat went about dressing queens of the night across the whole gender spectrum.

For his first on-schedule presentation in Paris, he offered them anything from gowns that trailed on the floor with a frothy train to body-baring numbers that left little to the imagination, like a look consisting solely of thin silver chains.

Elsewhere he mashed together ’50s and Victorian tropes, turning any notion of elegance into provocative statements. Corsets were revisited with snakeskin motifs and juxtaposed with half a pencil skirt that left one side bare, or patent leather pants and chains. A cocoon knit dress had a neckline so low it bared the belly button.

Dotted between the decadent dresses and destroyed knits was a handful of pieces that passed for off-the-rack offerings, like a slashed T-shirt or a suit overlaid with tulle slashed to ribbons, creating an uneven pin-striped effect.

Even with those, it was hard to reconcile commercial realism with his boisterous lineup, even in a season when designers are daring to bare and be bold in their casting. But given the increasing number of famous faces — and curves — turning to him for one-of-a-kind showstopping numbers, does he really need to dial down his extravagance to fit into a retail rack?