Walter Van Beirendonck popped up on a video contact to focus on his spring selection putting on a neon yellow sweatshirt, standing up momentarily to show off a smiley-deal with with a slogan in lieu of a mouth: “I wanna dance once again.”
You can understand the yearning, offered how the coronavirus pandemic silenced nightclub speakers and stilled mirror balls. But even just before that, new music-connected subcultures appeared to putter out, which the two perplexed — and inspired — the designer.
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Belgium can assert to be a birthplace of raving, and a pressure of electronic dance tunes that emerged in the 1980s identified as New Conquer. And now Van Beirendonck is introducing Neon Shadow, a fictional band partial to glow-in-the-darkish confront tape, zany neon Tyvek club wear, and cartoonish penis prints.
“I considered, ‘Why not create my individual subculture?’” the Antwerp-centered fashion maverick mused.
Van Beirendonck evidently experienced a blast generating his collection movie, akin to a trailer for a documentary about Neon Shadow in advance of its “intergalactic” tour in the year 2057. The Subs, a actual Belgian electro band, provided the soundtrack suited up in neon tailoring or graffiti-print jumpsuits, and clipped lightning-bolt-formed pegs to their earlobes and nipples.
Provocative slogans flash throughout the screen, which include, “Resist the blandness of the sleeping masses,” as the three band members ramble down a staircase, emerge from a DeLorean and conduct in entrance a teeming crowd, sweaty palms stretched toward them.
The dresses had been inventive and from time to time strange, specially patchwork neon bomber jackets and shirts with a designed-in black shadow connected to the back of the clothes. Observe jackets and working shorts winked to the glory times of gabber techno redingotes and blouses to The Incroyables, a stylish aristocratic subculture in Paris at the tail stop of the 1700s.
Whilst raving is a well-known inspiration this season, Van Beirendonck’s consider is daring, witty and arrives from the heart. “I always delight in likely to techno clubs and raves,” he claimed.
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