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John Galliano: Brilliant Madness
By: Godfrey Deeny
Photos by Gruber-FWD
Mar 12, 2002/ FWD/ --- Given the plethora of influences in a John Galliano collection,
one wonders whether the designer owns a private jet that hurtles him around the globe to
exotic locales.
That's a tribute to the immense richness of Galliano's imagination and his unique ability to
fuse half a dozen cultures into one great outfit.
At his late show Sunday night in the Theatre de l'Empire, Galliano visited China, Siberia
and Russia, with pit stops in the Andes and the Himalayas.
In lesser hands this would have been a confusing mess; in Galliano's it made for some pretty
amazing fashion.
Front-row sat rocker Lenny Kravitz, who looks likely to be the first person to get his hands
on Galliano's upcoming men's collection, for John has adopted Lenny as his male muse.
Kravitz and Kate Moss, who sat a few seats apart, beamed throughout the long wait for the show,
as ABBA, who are enjoying a new return to vogue, boomed out of the speakers.
Design great Philippe Starck, however, looked grumpy.
Clearly, he was unhappy with his third-row seating assignment.
Finally the lights dimmed, Abba quieted down, and a North American Indian medicine woman in
patchwork shearlings and fur booties hit the catwalk.
Knits came in a rainbow of colors with knobby pompoms; cardigans came padded in oriental
fabrics mixed with tartans and plaids.
Makeup maestro Orlando Pita outdid himself last Sunday, circling models' eyes with small
white feathers, or rendering them catlike with peasant feathers on their cheeks.
In among the maximalist madness were some fantastic clothes, especially the frilly, skilled
dresses.
You could almost hear the fashionable lady stylists salivating at the thought of getting
their hands on one.
Galliano likes to live dangerously and pulled his usual tightrope act of putting the finishing
touches to some outfits minutes before the show.
The designer was even spotted trotting out of a taxi and into the theater 20 minutes
before the scheduled start of his 8pm show.
Now that's ballsy, especially when the show was so great.
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