HERMÈS: RESADDLE TO MINISTECK

Gracia of Monaco and the "Kellybag"

Hermès stands for prestige, luxury and exquisite taste.
Most prominent representative of this noble brand is the Princess Gracia of Monaco: On the occasion of her wedding with Prince Rainier the Hermès bag, which Grace Kelly carried around like a life saving lady colt tightly stuck underneath her arm throughout the entire time of her engagement, has been renamed after her. Nowadays, one cannot imagine fashion without the "Kelly Bag": right now, the time of delivery amounts to three months.

Hermès: a saddler business changes directions

The notorious bag has been inspired by a transportation container not for lap dogs as one would immediately associate, but for saddles. Thierry Hermès founded the saddler business in 1837. In 1920, his grandson Emile introduced modern design and luxurious clothing into the business, but till now Hermès profits from its image as a qualitative superb saddler business. Hence it comes not by surprise that the characteristic motifs form stirrups on the famous silk scarves. In 1997, Hermès modernized its image by appointing the avant-garde fashion designer Marin Margiela to their chief designer.

Golf playing bunnies

The modernist development of Hermès has now gotten to a point where the new collection leaves old saddler values behind and reminds one of exuberant mescaline fed excesses and carefree childhood sceneries. The elegant silk ties and mundane scarves do not show stirrups, but bunnies playing golf, racoons, dolphins, a flying Pegasus and charmingly spread clover.

Resettle to Ministeck

What could underline the cuteness and modernity of the new Hermès design more than a neat Ministeck?
Ministeck is a children's game in which coloured plastic pins are pushed into a grid until it forms an individual picture. The artist Norbert Bayer, better known as Mister Ministeck produces with his contemporary mosaic portraits and pictures Plastic Pop Art.

Is fashion a minor art?

The association of haute couture with the very rich makes it suspect for many people.
The all round talent Cocteau once said: "I love fashion, because it dies young."
For Madeleine Vionnet the only true Grande Dame of fashion, whose couture house on the Parisian Avenue Montaigne shut its doors in 1939, Couture means far more.
To historians of fashion she is a legend. They have acclaimed her "The Architect of Couture", its only creative talent. For Madeleine Vionnet, who once was penniless, couture is not a minor art. Like the dance it is an evanescent art, but a great one. She sees herself as an artist on the level of, say, Ana Pavlova, the world famous Prim ballerina.

Fashion as Ministeck?

In times of conventionally produced confection, Hermès chief designers have been compared more to aristocrat riders rather than prim ballerinas, but with the new playful and conceptual design, Hermès innovative "nouveau chic" reminds one of fragments of Warhol. Hence the suitable abstraction of the new Hermès look is a Ministeck, seemingly innocent and naïve, but truly conceptual and intelligent behind the slick plastic surface.

TOUCHSCREENS
MINI NT
SPLASHSPLEEN
COVERS  UPDATED!
TETRIS ADVANCED
DIY-KITS
ANALOGUE EATS DIGITAL
FASHION
LOST FORMATS CONVENTION
IT'S A ME - MARIO
IMPRESSIONS
TV-TOWER TRAVELLERS KIT
PIXELPORTRAITS
KNOT IT RIGHT
A ROSE FOR HILDE  NEW!