Daily Front Row

2013 March 5

Paris Fall 2013: Valentino

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Valentino Fall 2013
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(PARIS) Valentino
Elizabethan gowns, blue Delft ceramics, Rembrandt florals, and Flemish paintings were just a few of the inspirational images tacked up on Maria Grazia Chiuri and Pier Paolo Piccioli's mood board backstage at Valentino this afternoon. The imaginative duo deftly translated the 16th and 17th century romance onto their runway with a cacophony of smart babydoll dresses laced with leather embroidered collars or scalloped dickies and exquisite macramé floral frocks that gently nodded to the prolific Dutch painter's blooming still life work in a color palette of noir, rouge, and "Elizabethan" blue, a favorite of Queen Elizabeth I. For evening, the emphasis was on sweeping gowns with a studious slant—either paired down, almost monastic renderings accompanied by that ever-present, buttoned up collar, or poetic riffs featuring a bounty of bead-encrusted floral embroidery that captured the very soul of the show: "Magical Realism."