VTMNTS. Spring 2023 - Zürich

(Images: VTMNTS 2022)

Guram Gvasalia's VTMNTS side project to VETEMENTS or however you are inclined to see it, is a morphing of concept brands under one banner.   Regardless of the marketing reasons behind the word play and abbreviation of the VETEMENTS brand name,  Guram's shrew business sense of attaining his anti-fashion statement has always held up as an ambiguous purpose.  Yet, the VETEMENTS sub-brand is only three seasons old, having debuted as a digital affair in July 2021 and when Paris runways returned in earnest throughout 2022, VTMNTS Fall showing was a crowd spectacle, Gvasalia has returned back to the digitized version for VTMNTS Spring 2023 Menswear and Ready-to-wear collections.  And it can be said that Guram works best when VETEMENTS and VTMNTS shows are of a crowdless expose.  They feel more rebellious, less restrained as a presentation, in reflecting that antithetic creativity which both he and his brother Demna, of Balenciaga fame, have exceled.

The latest VTMNTS collection was held inside a building still under construction within Zürich Airport, to which Guram remarked that the reasoning for staging his latest collection in this enclosed triangular looking bunker, was to evoke “...a church of the future, where you belong simply by being your true self."  With the world in turmoil and a war raging in Ukraine by Russian aggression, the trends that have emerged on the runway have been of the darker more gothic inclination, with the Gvasalia's sticking to their deconstruction and rebuilding of traditional fashion, while reworking, at times, an extremity of aesthetics.  It is Guram and Demna's ability to on sell their perspective brand names into niche markets, to which VETEMENTS and now VTMNTS are very sought after products, particularly throughout Asia.

There is no doubting VTMNTS latest collection holds an avant-garde feel, with elements of earlier VETEMENTS shows imprinted into its array, with exaggerated looks such as protective shoulder pads lined within blazers and tops, the double layering of jackets and coats.  Cropped bomber jackets, revealing naked mid drifts, yet holding, within a balanced masculine and tough resolve.   At times Guram has super charged men's styles that reflect the duality of both male and female aesthetics, while also redefining the stylizations of its masculinity.  This can also been seen in his Ready-to-Wear collection with the feminine crossing over into the masculine.  The color palette stays within from Guram's like of base and neutral colors, while playing around with kitsch brighter colors.  Which, in my opinion, is Guram toying with the garish street wear styles of the 1990s.   Also noted are the silver industrial insulation fabrics, which could be indictive of a need for environmental protection in our times of climate change, war and social calamity.

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A.Glass 2022