We have been covering the Glenn Martens Y/Project for some years now here in Paris and despite his shows being in the most impossible of locations; despite this real serious edginess to the materials, colors and cuts; and despite the super duper thin models and cross-over dressing, Glenn Martens always has indisputable style, class, and aye, even elegance when you see his work on the runway in person, or in pictures, or in the showroom – as photos below attest. Indeed mr Martens, like an old Belgian master, somehow has mastered the sartorial arts for men and we at BDMOTP plead no contest trying to find faults or errors.
And it is precisely that razor blade edginess that perfectly fits as an opening act for FW 2016 SS17 Paris Homme because, please believe us as we say, that at the moment of this very show a couple of days ago, Paris was still on edge – the sartorial arts thus conspiring with the city for dominance. As you probably may know the city of Paris has as of late been hit by bouts of terrorism, floods, transportation strikes, garbage strikes, and a whole host of other plagues ranging from rioting in the streets by disaffected youth and football hooligans, and everything else except perhaps grasshoppers falling from the sky trying to eat the plants & trees.
Or so it felt – a city ON EDGE, on a boat’s edge – so someone please describe our wonder when the Y/Project show was to be held in a famous boat called Maxim’s floating but docked on the river Seine right under the Eiffel Tower in the stifling 35°C heat with a humidity index going off the charts – when there was no air conditioning? On that same river which had been rising six meters higher just a week earlier leaving the quays dirty and smelly and making the metro by the dockside overflow with water were it not for little Hans Brinker, while – kid you not – Romanian and Hungarian football fans were chanting to the fashion crowds from behind the gates. Then imagine 300 people going on that boat watching Glenn Martens Y/Project. That’s edgy man! That’s really over the edge. Enough to make a strong man weary!
But that is precisely every time what the old master Martens intends methinks. Because his other shows are in basements which are too narrow and too crowded with impossible low ceilings where it smells. Well, that is called underground. Whereas this show, was decidedly up-ground and nicely set under the Eiffel Tower but the conditions and the times made it more scary and weary than anything that we had previously experienced underground. Let’s call it the Glenn Martens experience.
But then when one can see all that elegance and style come out, it makes everything good and worthwhile all of a sudden. Because the Y/Project collections breathe style, breathe elegance, and they breathe the spirit of Paris. Life on the edge of a drunken boat in the heat in Paris. Le Bateau Ivre of Arthur Rimbaud. Just maintain your class and your style and your course upon the waves and all will be well. Ship ahoy as we sail straight upon the floods. Paris in the summer of 2016. All is well thanks to Glenn Martens Y/Project – une création extraordinaire!
Posted by Sandro and photos from Y Project press.
