Gaetano Busuttil – I’m going to start off my review for Gaetano’s solo show by highlighting a simple but very important fact. This was the guy’s FIRST solo collection. It is not easy to put together a solo collection, not easy to find the courage and stamina to go for it and definitely not easy to create something that was very well received by the audience. Simply put, everyone I spoke to, described it as great.
All photos by Kurt Paris
Gaetano presented us with a lovely collection titled ‘Nymph’, the story behind it, is that of power, -a dark, strong, sensual woman, Gaetano has a true appreciation for the female form and designs for confident, strong women. I’m aways happy when I see designers go for femininity – the truth is it is actually much harder to design dresses that celebrate the body rather than engulf it (as for instance, in more androgynous styles). The quality of his tailoring is high. Gaetano is a skilled tailor – the craftsmanship very good and the pieces featured some lovely hand beading and intricate details. All the pieces are also very well finished. Gaetano is also someone who I would most definitely recommend to anyone wishing to experience the process of getting a piece designed and customised for oneself.
Nonetheless, if after your first solo show you manage to earn absolutely no criticism and only praise – well you’re either a god or people are not being totally honest. Basically, although I enjoyed the show, There were a few things, I’d have wished to be different.
First of all, I would have gone for a different hair and makeup look. Not that the hair or the makeup were badly executed – the team did a great job in both cases but the clothes were very elaborate – too elaborate to afford a heavy look. In my opinion, both the hair and makeup should have been kept very, very clean and simple. When you present elaborate art, you need to be sure that people’s attention is focused solely on that art. In this case, I felt that the hair and makeup looks provided too much of a distraction from the clothes. I can understand that there was a ‘nymph power’ theme but I still feel that the wild hair and full makeup did not really complement those pieces.
My other criticism is in line with
what I wrote about yesterday, I did not feel that some of the models were the right fit for these pieces. Now let me be the first to admit that these pieces are very, very hard to find the right models for but in certain cases, I feel that proper justice was not done to the outfit.
As regards, the pieces themselves, my absolute favourite was the finale piece and Victoria was the perfect, perfect model to wear that piece and that outstanding crown – she really transformed it all and brought it to life. There were some other great pieces that would look awesome on the body of a diva starlet at some red carpet event. Some of the pieces are not necessarily something I would wear myself even because they require a different shape and body but pieces like the finale piece and this black dress in the pictures down below still excite me – pity I’m not a 6-foot tall stick thin model.
There were a couple of other pieces though that I thought incorporated too many elements – such as the ones with the fan-like elements such as the bodysuit from that section, although model Rebecca did model it perfectly. Fashion nowadays tends to favour simplicity over extravagance so sometimes, it is good to tone things down slightly so as to keep things feeling fresh and new.
For his next collection, what I would really love, is for him to possibly streamline his ideas a little bit more and to experiment slightly with different, possibly simpler hair and makeup looks. It might also be interesting to add something totally different and use sneakers and backpacks a la Chanel.
Once again, I raise a glass to this young designer and look forward to seeing what he does next.
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