Tom Ford walked away from fashion several years ago—he’s currently on location in Rome filming Cry to Heaven, a movie based on a novel by Anne Rice about a castrati—but he’s still very much the talk of fashion. Ford’s Gucci era was heavily mined by Demna, and his Yves Saint Laurent collections are being referenced too. Then, of course, there’s the Tom Ford brand itself, where Haider Ackermann is operating at the height of his powers.
After the deep midnight blue of last season’s set, Ackermann turned the lights way, way up, the better to see the sharp white and black he opened with: double-breasted men’s suits, animal spot intarsias, and, most intriguingly, slouchy trousers hanging onto women’s hips with the help of a thin belt that had slipped its loops. Then came a series of looks featuring see-through plastic: a shrunken blazer, a trench, a babushka. Leave it to Ackermann to turn a material associated with grannies and children into a medium for kink. Underneath A-line skirts in the stuff, the models’ lacy underthings and TF logo stockings were clearly visible.
It wasn’t all a come-on, though. Another new development was denim in a dark rinse that had been pre-faded and deeply creased; it came in two cuts for women, slouchy and not, and the guys got an ultra high-waisted style, a silhouette repeated with trousers topped by pastel American Psycho button-downs and rep ties. This was Ackermann’s most diverse collection yet. As ever, though, he was at his most vital with his tailoring. Pinstripes or micro houndstooth, he accessorized the suits with shirts unbuttoned down to the navel and lush flower corsages.
All of this was sold by a cast of models who prowled and stalked and vamped with abandon, some camping it up, others taking it deadly seriously. This has become one of Ackermann’s hallmarks, and on a day (and night) filled with back-to-back shows, it was divertingly delightful.
For the evening: just two event dresses. In black and featuring tendril-like straps, they were positively demure compared to the sheer number suspended by a single strap from last season that Teyana Taylor wore to the Time 100 Gala. It could be Ackermann is saving his big statements for the Oscars next Sunday. The guys substituted silk scarves for shirts underneath their cropped jackets and there were more of those trousers slung from a thin belt and dipping dangerously low on one side. We’ll be watching closely to see which man dares to wear them on the red carpet.