Marc Jacobs Spring 23 ‘Heros’ collection in NYC.

“Fashion is life-enhancing, and I think it’s a lovely, generous thing to do for other people,” said the great, indomitable Vivienne Westwood. 

Marc Jacobs shares Westwood’s belief in fashion’s nobility. It goes to the core of who he is as a creator. In the notes for his Fall 2023 show at New York’s Park Avenue Armory on Thursday evening, he cited Westwood’s quote. He titled the collection “Heroes” and dedicated it to “all of our heroes past, and young heroes present.” 

Multiple inspirations may have been on Jacobs’ mind, but his primary references were to Westwood. Her death in December likely informed the show’s almost elegiac mood. The armory’s cavernous space was empty but for a row of folding chairs that ran its length on one side, and a musician’s sheet-music stand positioned at the far end, opposite the entrance. Violinist Jennifer Koh played music by Philip Glass as the models walked, some with crossed arms, emphasizing the sober aura.

Specific references to Westwood came in the spikey, bleach-blonde coiffeurs worn by some of the models, the mile-high platform shoes that Jacobs loves, 3-D ribbed swirls on the breasts of knit bodices, and full-skirted, sometimes bustled silhouettes. But in this voluptuousness of pattern and cut, the collection also referenced the heroes of traditional couture, those collective masters for whom the craft of clothing was holy.

The clothes were intricate, whether intrinsically or via styling: lean, draped dresses and skirts under inflated outerwear; jackets upended and worn as skirts, sleeves tied in back. Throughout, Jacobs incorporated major cargo elements, with pockets aplenty. And as always, he referenced himself, here in polka dots, now tone-on-tone; shots of majestic red that recalled his Fall 2015 ode to Diana Vreeland, and a long sweater-over-skirt that sent the mind back to his first collection for Louis Vuitton, Fall 1998. That look offered a rare minimalist digression from the overall abundance. 

As for the coats, there’s a saying that in New York, a walking city, your coat is your car. If so, Jacobs’ were Aston Martins, from simple mannish toppers to geometric patchwork beauties that took your breath away. 

Whether in homage to Westwood or to Jacobs’ own inner drummer, audacity coursed through this collection, visually at first, in the bold interplay of punk and haute. Then, for the finale, Jacobs silenced the music, letting the models pound out their defiance in their massive footwear. It gave new meaning to the notion of chic attitude.