VALENTINO READY TO WEAR S/S 2012

As four weeks of shows draw to a close, it’s apparent that the value of the sincere and personally felt vision is almost the paramount thing in fashion. To make a lasting impression, any house or individual designer needs the ability to open a window on a world of their own—and then make us believe we can be part of it. Maria Grazia Chiuri and Pier Paolo Piccioli have reached that state of grace at Valentino—a house which has always “owned” such nebulous qualities as prettiness, fragility, and romance. At one point, it seemed as if those notions could have slipped into history with the retirement of Valentino himself. But now his successors are achieving an effortless balance between maintaining the fantasy, and making it beautifully accessible to a modern girl. Their spring show was a long essay on Valentino’s supremacy in the art of finessing everything that can be done with lace – but brought wholly into a contemporary context.