The Dior Fall/Winter 2022-2023 Haute Couture collection is the brainchild of Maria Grazia Chiuri and features the work of Ukrainian artist Olesia Trofymenko. Chiuri first saw Trofymenko’s work in an exhibition at the MAXXI National Museum of 21st Century art in Rome, in a programme dedicated to Ukrainian artists. From a distance these pieces looked like paintings but drawing closer they were seen to be textile art, richly embroidered tapestries. These inspired Chiuri’s collection and the backdrop for Dior’s show was Trofymenko’s huge tapestries and elaborately beaded leitmotif’s of the Tree of Life featuring flowers, fruits and birds.
This couture season, Dior gives us a conservative collection. At times, it looks like it is straight from the set of “Picnic at Hanging Rock”. Victorian high-neck blouses and white skirts feature alongside a celebration of culture marked by traditional Ukrainian embroidery.
A Mix of Ideas
There are no pants at all, a surprising omission, and all dresses are calf length. The collection starts off in white, coffee, beige and black tones with a few cutouts – mostly around the neckline. The coats are bulky, in line with what we’ve been seeing on many of the haute couture runways. What is most surprising about this collection is the nod towards 70’s folk costumes – the deep rounded bodices on dresses and pinafores. This is meshed with a 2020’s aesthetic – gathering around the necklines and self-pleating fabrics.
The intricate embroidery is done painstakingly by hand to look like lace.
Other pieces are handsmocked using piping from the same fabric. Another nod to culture was the dirndl type tops common in European cultural dress. Corset tops have been across many collections recently, but none was quite so much like a dirndl as this one in Dior’s show.
Some of the black dresses had an almost Mrs Danvers feel to them. Think your housekeeper alongside your dress of folklore. The Tree of Life is part of many cultures’ representations of the connection between different realms of underworld, earth and heaven. This represents the connection between generations past, present and future. For Trofymenko, this symbol has become something of a leitmotif in her work where it symbolises ‘womankind, the continuation of life and a bright future’. Nowhere was it better represented than the frontispiece of this dress.
There was very little colour, just a spot of deep purple and a couple of dresses in red.
With the war against Ukraine still continuing, it is wonderful to celebrate the work of one of their native artists. Fashion is capable of making a political statement. And with this collection, Dior makes a statement about supporting the Ukrainian people, and their hope for a better, brighter future.
