Move over stealth wealth, ultra-rich dressing is back

Telegraph

27-01-2025

Let's be clear, haute couture has always been for the ultra-wealthy. The clue's in the word haute. But with the leaders of the planet's richest, most powerful tech companies doggedly sticking to a wardrobe that looks more Aldi than Armani Privé and film stars not paying for anything they wear on a red carpet (although often they are paid), it has been hard to see couture's purpose of late.
Meanwhile, ready-to-wear labels such as Lora Piano, Brunello Cuccinelli and The Row, all makers of sublimely luxurious, loosely cut clothes that to the untrained eye might look like quite nice blankets, have cleaned up.
Yet with
In the seven years she has headed the creative side of Dior, Maria Grazia Chiuri, often derided by the social media gallery for being 'too commercial', has made Dior one of those high end luxury brands that sells not just accessories, but a lot of tailored clothes. She placed its meticulously tailored Bar Jacket (first introduced in 1947 as part of Dior's iconic New Look) front and centre and constantly updated it. It is already a
Now she's turned it into something quirkier and more gothic: a frock coat, sometimes jet beaded and long enough to be worn as a (mini) tuxedo dress. At first sight these frock coats appeared to be cut away at the front, and buttonless. But as she explained backstage, the nehru neck lined gilets and filmy chemises underneath were buttoned into the frock coats. They could be worn as a combination or separately. More practicality.
The frock coats were part military, part Mad Hatter – there was definitely something of the Victorian
Alice in Wonderland
afoot. Black goth jackets with puff sleeves, trompe l'œil feathery capes (the feathers were fabric fronds), airy crinolines and Mohican hairdos intercut white broderie anglaise baby dolls. All nicely discombobulating.
It was Yves Saint Laurent, barely into his 20s, who, in 1958, came up with the baby doll silhouette when he was at Dior. Although it has been far eclipsed as a Dior signature by Dior's 1947 New Look, the baby doll (or trapeze as it was known) has been much copied ever since. Bypassing the waist in a triangular whoosh of fabric, it's so different from the chiselled bar jacket it's hard to imagine the same customer wearing it.
But as Chiuri says, 'fashion is all about shape shifting and transforming our bodies.' It was smart of her to pivot to a more youthful mood – and smarter still to ensure there was plenty of recognisably Bar Jacket tailoring. There are plenty of inexpensive dupes of The Row's tailoring which are fairly convincing until you feel the fabric. But I've never seen a bar jacket copy that comes close to the real thing. Chiuri is a maestro of unmistakably expensive but never vulgar polish.
Under its brilliant
Roseberry is a big talent who, since he joined it in 2019, has taken Schiaparelli from an also ran heritage house to one that attracts a disproportionate amount of media attention. In the beginning, he achieved this with slickly orchestrated gimmicks guaranteed to stir up controversy. Remember the dresses he designed two years ago featuring what looked like
This collection was gimmick free however, unless you count that tiny waist (the nearest I've ever seen on a catwalk, to the waists in John Singer Sargent portraits). Instead there were plenty of cantilevered bustiers, cleverly framed behind drape-fronted corsets – and sweeping skirts.
I'm sure Roseberry was working on this collection long before