#PerfectDiaries: Amber Later reveals what it was really like walking in Olivier Rousteing’s Jean Paul Gaultier couture show.
Jean Paul Gaultier’s creative takeover each season allows us to sit and examine how his legacy of pop culture and fashion-defining moments from the 1990s and 2000s have inspired the new generation of fashion masterminds like Glenn Martens and Olivier Rousteing, cross-linking their design signature with Gaultier’s creative creations. This season, Rousteing’s vision was poured into taking over the house of JPG and creating new language cues, through his prism of opulence and futuristic glamour.
Perfect’s contributing editor and model, Amber Later made her couture runway debut at the show, writing a diary of her experience backstage and on the catwalk, as well the multiple rounds of shots, vitamin drips, fittings and hours of preparations behind the fashion spectacle that brought together fashion history with perspective.
Because my flight was delayed on the pre-departure tarmac, I didn’t have time to visit my hotel before going to the fitting for the Jean Paul Gaultier 2022 Couture show, designed by Olivier Rousteing of Balmain. Sometimes, I find that when the culture of France (or, really, any nation for that matter) attempts to celebrate itself, over-deference to the past can cheapen the very thing it is attempting to enshrine and mythologize.
I admire Rousteing’s work at Balmain, where he’s been able to retain a sense of classically French elegance without feeling like a staid homage to faded glory. His work is contemporary without antagonising or degrading tradition, and I was eager to see how he’d relate to a legacy and body of work as influential, well developed, and recognizable as Gaultier’s. At the fitting, I tried on several looks, including the final bridal outfit, ultimately worn by Kristen McMenamy, which Rousteing directed me to walk in as though I were trampling over the body of a groom. I was very pleased with the look eventually assigned to me, which I felt was a seamless integration of Rousteing and Gaultier’s aesthetics, specifically a hybrid of the iconic cone bra corset famously worn by Madonna in the 90s and looks 31 and 34 from Rousteing’s recent SS22 ready-to-wear collection for Balmain.
That evening, I was sent to a hotel to receive an IV infusion and infrared facial treatment from a beautician and health specialist. I didn’t know or understand the chemistry of everything being injected into me (Choline? Ubichinon? Lymphdiaral?), but am easily persuaded as far as novel health procedures go, and also trusted Rousteing and the team at Gaultier enough to know they wouldn’t steer me wrong. I consider myself a fairly critically minded person, but also recognize my weakness for any fruit, vegetable, vitamin, or supplement with a name I can’t pronounce and/or vague but passionately ascribed health benefits (maca, spirulina, E3 live, etc.). Placebo or not, the treatments refreshed me from my flight immensely and I woke up in the morning with an excitement and appreciation for the show that was previously hampered by traveller’s exhaustion.
A friend of mine who was also walking in the show, the playwright/renaissance man Jeremy O. Harris, invited me to his hotel for a fifteen minute sauna before our respective call times. On the way over there I stopped at a vintage store and bought sunglasses, a vintage red Versace t-shirt with a no smoking logo embroidered on the sleeve, and a blue silk button down shirt that’s long enough for me to wear as a dress. Finally arriving at the JPG headquarters in the early afternoon, I was relieved to learn my hair and makeup would be done minimally, with natural, soft touches. Generally, for runway work, I prefer more subtle hair and makeup looks, as they place more emphasis on the clothes and also help feature the models more clearly and distinguished from one another (editorial work is a different matter).
Of course, each show and collection requires a different approach, but if it doesn’t feel necessary or uniquely inspired, I always prefer erring on the side of simplicity and straightforwardness (it also makes going out afterwards easier). The most significant (and most French) aspect of the Gaultier show was its democratic spirit, the way each model ended our walk with an appearance on a balcony overlooking a street flooded with fashion fans and curious pedestrians. It was very humbling to walk outside and be greeted by so many viewers, not only to immediately appreciate the significance of the collection and what it meant to Gaultier and Rousteing’s audiences, but also to feel connected to those audiences in a way I rarely get to at work.
Because fashion images, both runway and otherwise, primarily circulate after the fact, I almost never get a visceral sense of what people’s responses are outside of online comments, reviews, and opinion pieces. Even inside where the show was being held, it was a pleasure to hear people loudly cheer throughout, a minor rupture of decorum that befits the famous enfant terrible of French fashion (in an interlude between the male and female looks, audio recordings of journalists describing Gaultier with that same expression were sampled). Rousteing, a pioneer of luxury branding on social media, has always been committed to making the industry more open and accessible, and this show was no exception. Couture in 2022 is a bit of a paradox. On one hand, it represents many of the fashion industry’s excesses and liabilities: inaccessibility, impracticality, and an emphasis on handicraft in an age of machine production.
On the other, it is the annual event that most legitimises fashion as an art form by prioritising creativity and technical skill over commercial viability. I think that couture is generally what models most enjoy walking in and what, based on the outside crowd’s reaction, audiences most enjoy viewing. My favourite memory from the day will forever be the finale, where I stood directly across from Gaultier himself and watched a childlike glee overtake his face before he rose to join hands with Rousteing. The duo then progressed outside to greet the people whose admiration and affection have made their work possible and worthwhile. I couldn’t have asked for a more exciting, more Parisian, show to make my couture debut in.
