Slimane back in black as king of Paris fashion week

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Superstar designer Hedi Slimane declared that black is back on Friday as he returned to the Paris catwalk after a two-year absence to revolutionize Celine.

With his two biggest fans, Lady Gaga and Karl Lagerfeld, sitting next to each other in the front row, Slimane drew a pitch-black portrait of his hometown which he called "Paris The Night".

He turned the Invalides – where Napoleon rests in his tomb – into a giant shadowy nightclub, sending out 68 of his 72 models in looks hewn from a new deep midnight black he has been working on for the last nine months.

With Lady Gaga in the front row, Slimane draws a pitch-black portrait of his hometown during Paris Fashion Week in Paris, France, September 28, 2018. /AFP Photo

The "Sultan of skinny" stayed true to his very personal style, with skinny ties, slinky black suits and leather jackets for both men and women.

While some fans of his British predecessor Phoebe Philo cried foul on social media, the Wall Street Journal's critic Christina Binkley said Slimane has the Midas touch.

"He just launched his thing at Celine – no less stark a brand reset – and there will be broad applause aside from a few careful critics," she said.

French actress Catherine Deneuve (2nd left), US singer and actress Lady Gaga (5th on left) and German fashion designer Karl Lagerfeld (6th on left) were among the celebs in the front row during Paris Fashion Week in Paris, France, September 28, 2018. /AFP Photo

The man who is credited with inventing both the skinny and oversized looks that have dominated fashion over the last decade, lengthened his men's suits and refined the mini-dresses he showed previously at Saint Laurent.

Earlier the painfully private Slimane, 50, who confessed that has been plagued by tinnitus over the last year, said that would remain true to himself.

"I stand firm for my principles. Why should I give up on what defines me? Becoming someone else on the pretext that what I did in the past has been digested or imitated" was nonsense, he told the French daily Le Figaro.

A model presents a creation by designer Hedi Slimane during Paris Fashion Week in Paris, France, September 28, 2018. /VCG Photo

Slimane is adding a men's line at Celine and has already dropped the accent from the brand's logo.

"You don't shake things up by avoiding making waves," he said, "When there is no debate, it's blind conformity."

(Top Photo: Hedi Slimane acknowledges the audience at the end of his Spring/Summer 2019 women's ready-to-wear collection show for fashion house Celine during Paris Fashion Week in Paris, France, September 28, 2018. /AFP Photo)

Source(s): AFP