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Anyone else read this? I am absolutely obsessed. [64]
Blurb from hintmag:The
evening began circa 1980 with a cocktail at Maria Luisa to celebrate
issue 21 of cult French magazine Encens. Marc Jacobs, a recent convert,
was so anxious to get his hands on a copy that he sent a messenger 150
kilometers outside of Paris to Epernay, in the heart of France?s
champagne country, to pick one up hot off the press. Six years old,
Encens isn't new, but it has reached critical mass. "Ah, when was the
last time you saw a magazine that dared to talk about fashion, and
nothing but fashion from cover to cover?" sighed proprietress Maria Luisa Poumaillou
as she sipped on bubbly. Flipping through the issue, I tried to think
of the last time I'd seen so many men dressed elegantly oversized,
notably designer Christophe Lemaire in a sweeping herringbone overcoat.
Sybille Walter and Samuel Drira, Encens' founders and
principal collaborators, photograph and style most of the shoots and
write the text themselves, with additional photo contributions from
designer Bruno Pieters and the talented Miguel Villalobos, styling by
Paris PR prince Kuki de Salvertes and English translations by
the unruly Bruce Benderson. The result is about as close to a style
time machine back to the elegant Parisian 1980s as one could hope for.
A shoot of Jean Paul Gaultier's current spring collection melds
seamlessly with a personal selection from his archives (house ads from
1984 with Claudia Huidobro in a fez and baggy pajama jacket, and tomboy
Leslie Winer looking very Querelle in sailor stripes in another ad from
1983). Drira is passionate about vintage Marie Claire, when Claude Brouet and Catherine Lardeur
were at the helm of the French magazine, both of whom were at the
party. "We want to make an old magazine today," he says. "What we?re
doing is like curating a show." The citation from Donna Karan in
American Vogue from 1975?"I was working with a soft look??sets the mood
for an oversized shoot by Sybille Walter, featuring Number (N)ine,
Haider Ackermann, Matthew Ames and Véronique Branquinho. So it?s
everything old is new again ad infinitum.
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