As is so often the case with Maria Grazia Chiuri’s Dior, the hats said it all. Previous seasons have seen Parisienne-chic berets or veiled Beat Girl caps. This time it was more “aw shucks” than “ooh la la” with “unfinished” straw hats as a homespun sensibility took over. And Dior’s expensively clad country cousins trod the runway looking (almost) like extras from Oklahoma.
But the prairie edge was just that — an edge. It wasn’t full-on prairie style as so many other elements were drawn in with the homespun theme the dominant element.
What was key here was that Dior summed up a trend that’s been running throughout Fashion Month but that has come to the fore during Milan Fashion Week and now in Paris.
It’s a raw-edged look, summed up by those straw hats and also by the raffia dresses, the straw-toned crochet with handmade appliqué and much more.
It all points to a summer in which the wider fashion sector should be thinking less about perfection and more about a charming, quirky imperfection that allows handcrafts to shine. And it’s a them that can still offer something for everyone from the determined minimalist to those who love casual cool and women for whom dress-down Friday is an abomination.
At Dior, a series of mini dresses, artfully cut and draped but still looking homespun, added to the mood, their mottled stripe decoration also confirming our Disrupted Stripe trend.
Meanwhile knits were worn inside out with the stitching visible and the loose ends of yarns left uncut. Even dresses for after dark or special occasions came with their own craft macramé inserts, again with loose threads a key feature.
And on the accessories front, the look extended beyond those hats with rope-tied espadrilles and rope belts loosely wrapped around tie-dye or ombré overalls or roughly pleated tie-dye skirts.
It didn’t make much of an impact on bags — this is Dior after all and selling as many leather bags as possible is its job. But for those inspired by the look, the options for backpacks, totes, beach bags, belt bags and boho bags are many and varied. Just remember to keep the materials raw, the prints naive and the embellishment homespun.
