Reality Check

Though diametrically opposed, Louis Vuitton’s Pre-Fall ’19 offerings for both men and women draw similar parallels between the past and present, as Amy Yasmine discovers.

- Amy Yasmine

Speak to any hardcore Louis Vuitton fan, and they’re sure to divide into two separate camps: For one, there are those loyal to Nicolas Ghesquière’s romantic futurism (Storm Trooper-meets-French Renaissance tailoring, anyone?)—and as of late, “hypebeasts” du jour who tend to gravitate towards Virgil Abloh’s street-eclecticism. It certainly says a lot about the French maison’s duplicity; a visual approach that had not only captured the hearts of multiple generations, but also a paradigm of today’s modern individualists. Take the maison’s avid supporters, for example: from current poster girl and Game of Thrones actress Sophie Turner to French first lady Brigitte Macron, to Hollywood royalty Jayden Smith and hip-hop’s messiah Kanye West—all who speak the same universal language of Vuitton.

Indeed, therein lies the brilliance of both Ghesquière’s and Abloh’s artistry—no matter how different each designer narrates his story; for at the heart of each chapter is an ode to the spirit of travel. Here, is where two diametrically opposite worlds collide.

As if to bank on the current zeitgeist, this PreFall ’19 season saw both Nicolas Ghesquière and Virgil Abloh zero in on the world’s current state of affairs, with an uncanny nod to the Americas. For the latter, this meant looking back at civil rights icon, Martin Luther King Jr—but for the Frenchman, his answer is deeply rooted in the free world’s most heavily theatricised history: the Wild Wild West.