Overturning what we think we know about beauty has been the challenge of every creative spirit since the dawn of time. And turning the mundane into exceptional is one of the great fashion challenges of our day. The most virtuous designers know this well and never stop shaking all our certainties. That’s why seeing Demna with a pack of Lay’s chips instead of the clutch bag doesn’t surprise insiders so much. But what if the new Balenciaga bag were a bag of chips? What if the creative director flaunted at an unofficial event? It would happen that another certainty of the right-thinking would be broken and imagination and creativity blends to give us a unique piece.
Fashion for me is a mirror, it’s a reflection of what’s happening around us.” So Demna, the quintessential “rule breaker,” said recently in an interview for the French edition of Vogue. “That’s what manifests itself in my collections. It’s life that speaks to people, it’s everyday life.” His mirroring himself in pop culture, reworking in a creative key and relaunching on the market has been the school since “far” 2011 with the launch of the Balenciaga maxi bag that replicated the hooked shopper of IKEA Frakta. Same color, same shape but different materials and a cost, 1,700 euros, which caused scandal. There is no longer any doubt: Demna has a real talent for turning trash into treasure. And so, after throwing the totally destroyed sneakers, a garbage bag like it-bag and the Crocs as luxury accessories, it did it again with a new idea.
The new Balenciaga bag designed by Demna
So it happened that the designer spent the last weekend using an empty bag of Lay’s as a bag. Sitting in the front row for the end-of-year fashion show at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Antwerp, Demna nonchalantly sported his “greasy” accessory. While he was holding it on his knees or under his arm. Just like as it was a luxury clutch bag. That the ostentation of the Lay’s bag is a spoiler of the next couture collaboration? Many are already swearing yes. After all, creative professionals such as Demna or Jeremy Scott have been playing for years with the codes and symbols of consumerism (‘invitation of Balenciaga’s latest fashion show to the New York Stock Exchange consisted of a bunch of fake dollars). And so entire collections were born from the logos of McDonald’s or DHL. The difference here, though, is that the provocative bag is not a derivative or makeover of a tote bag. Yes, it’s just a maxi packet of French fries, ready and savory the one we found in large supermarkets o superstores. Can you believe that?
https://vm.tiktok.com/ZMN2dT1wm/?k=1
Reactions on Tik Tok
Let’s start with an assumption: in Demna’s mind, anything can have a “fashion statement.” And it is precisely the ugliest or most normal articles that generate maximum desire. Demna never makes meaningless provocations. As As Assia Neumann Dayan observed a few months ago on Twitter about “totally destroyed” sneakers: “buying broken shoes for fifteen hundred euros is perhaps a great metaphor”. Of what? Of the historical moment which ironically we live in a dirty and destroyed world that we are never living as we are now.
Needless to say, though, that even this time, his idea has aroused great outrage for many. Especially from the people of TikTok, so much so that the video post went viral. “Balenciaga has just decided to see how much more people who buy from them can be mocked.” So, to quote a comment, someone wrote an anonymous account called beyonceisaverageatbest. But, as Demna has said in the past, his work is not meant to “be understood by social media criticism.” He doesn’t care. The aim is to enter the history of global fashion with a tight leg. To take a position of honor. And, like it or not, he’s just succeeding.
CURLYCURL 