Watching Jeff Goldblum close this show was worth the admission alone. Clad in a dark, furry mohair hemmed and elbowed overcoat, dark big-break pants and dark chisel toe shoes, his walk was at first linear and direct. Then one arm came up at his side and undulated, snakily. The other arm followed, as if seeking counterbalance. He veered rightwards in front of the first photographers’ pit, and as he did so, shot a sharp, hawky gaze—eyes narrowed—90 degrees to his left. The applause rose as he headed with woozy intent to the vectored tunnel that led backstage. A man on the edge, Goldblum worked it.
Which was the appropriate climax for a collection named Body of Work that approached the hierarchy of workwear as its baseline assignment while echoing against the body of work of both its designers. Inevitably, for instance, the starry cast here recalled the classic Prada fall 2012 collection whose protagonists included Willem Dafoe, Gary Oldman, Tim Roth, Jamie Bell and Adrien Brody. Backstage that day Miuccia Prada described it as “a parody of man power.” Oldman called it “two-minute theater—a short blast of performance.”
Goldblum apart, this 10-year anniversary sequel featured Thomas Brodie-Sangster, Asa Butterfield, Damson Idris, Tom Mercier, Jaden Michael, Louis Partridge, Ashton Sanders, Filippo Scotti and show opener Kyle MacLachlan. Similar too to that original, this show employed its cast to role play masculine archetypes whose relative status by occupation was both delineated and disrupted by their uniforms. As Prada said in a pre-written quote released after the show: “We were thinking about meaningful fashion, pieces that make sense. Clothes that make people feel important.” She added: ”The collection celebrates the idea of working—in all different spheres and meanings. It is a practical, everyday thing. But here, you are formally important. You are not casual.”
Also not casual were certain parallels with Raf Simon’s fall 2012 collections both for Jil Sander and, to a lesser extent, his own brand. As at Sander then, at Prada today one masculine category was framed in hulking leather trench coats, in a fit oversized to infantilize—or at least deauthorize—as at the 10-year-gone Raf show. There were also hugely cinched waists on lengthened bombers and field jackets, and preening, relishably ostentatious furry mohair trimmings—most successfully served on an oversized orange MA1. Whether these details served to emphasize the dignity of work through the elevation of its uniform (as the notes today had it) or acted to parodically undermine the self-importance of conventional masculine status systems (as Mrs. Prada put it a decade ago) depended on where (and maybe when) you were coming from.
As at the Prada fall collection of a year ago, these facades all shared a similar base undergarment that rested between them and the body within. This year’s update on last year’s knit long john was, said Simons, “lightweight material overalls, deux-pieces, referring to the idea of work, movement, activity and leisure.” Expanded in volume and rematerialized in leather or treated silk, these overalls were sometimes also given star facade billing. Thus overall versus furry mohair trimmed executive overcoat encompassed the vocational span of this finely performed and highly Pradafied spectrum of modern workwear.
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