Kanye West made his fashion debut last night in Paris, France. The rapper premiered his Spring/Summer Collection for women, titled Dw. Many celebs like Ciara and the Olsen twins were in attendance including the most important woman in fashion, Ms Anna Wintour.
Check out some reviews below:
The Telegraph UK
To be fair, what West and his ghosts sent out looked well enough made, and all that video-set experience means he knows how to make a model look sexy – no death-head make-up for him. Backstage, he was even tweaking the clothes before the models walked. But Oh dear God, those clothes: does the world really need another slashed bandage dress that requires a woman to go commando and depilate every last centimetre of her body or for that matter another pair of Balmain-esque spray-on shiny jeans? Not sure those fur rucksacks are a major – or even minor – contribution to civilisation either. Why so much fur in a spring collection?
We could endlessly debate the merits of hooker dressing – it comes down to taste in the end. But we can certainly take issue with clothes so tight they reduce a woman’s walk to a hobble. Not big, not clever, and not welcome. Afterwards, we asked an Olsen if she’d liked it. “Yes!”, she trilled. Any particular look? “Ummm….”. Exactly. FULL REVIEW
The New York Times
What Mr. West eventually showed was confusing as well. Though designers in Paris are presenting collections for next spring and summer this week, Mr. West’s collection was heavy on leather, fur and coats, some pieces dripping with so much fox you couldn’t tell if they were stoles or backpacks. The show opened with a hot-club moment, with slinky ridged dresses like those of Pucci and Balmain, with slits and zippers cut around the sides, and a heavy motorcycle jacket that had its sleeves sliced in half. A sparkly cropped jacket had so many bits of flare in it that you could imagine Mr. West sampling fashion like he samples different styles of music. There was one good-looking pair of color-blocked pants in blue and coral, but it was obvious that most of the clothes suffered from a poor fit. FULL REVIEW
STYLE
What we actually saw was something that looked like a baby Balmain vision of womenswear. The context was impeccable—soundtrack and staging exactly what you’d expect from someone whose 360-degree vision has been responsible for some of the best albums and concerts of the past decade. The clothes? Heavy might be the operative word: zippers in excelsis; suede and leather high-performance clothing; beading, crystals, and appliqué weighting jackets and tops. And more fur than you’d want on a night when the mercury hit the roof in Paris. It’s kind of a cheap shot to go the trying-too-hard route with someone who is so undoubtedly passionate about what he is doing, but at the same time, it’s frustrating that someone who seems to almost effortlessly realize his vaulting musical ambitions comes up short elsewhere, at least on the first attempt. Of course, what Kanye West is trying to achieve is unprecedented. There isn’t a fashion designer alive who could match his music. But tonight’s show suggests that conquering his new medium is a work in progress. FULL REVIEW
