Photo A look from Bouchra Jarrar's first collection for Lanvin.
Last year, when the much-loved designer Alber Elbaz was unceremoniously fired as the longtime creative director of Lanvin, the fashion world cried foul. How would that storied brand, so defined by Mr. Elbaz, continue without him? In February, when the label's internal creative team produced a sloppy, unfocused collection, it seemed a portent of more mess to come.
But in March, the maison that Jeanne Lanvin built named Bouchra Jarrar, founder of her own house and alumna of Balenciaga and of Christian Lacroix, as its artistic director of women's collections. And though the official unveiling of her version of Lanvin will be in September, during the Paris women's wear shows, she was in New York this week to give retailers (and some critics) a sneak peek of what she has been doing.
And I have to tell you, it's pretty smart.
The combination of Ms. Jarrar's finely honed aesthetic — which might be categorized as "haute cool," a kind of luxurious minimalism, where every button is its own fetish — with softer, more feminine colors and prints, a legacy of the house's founder, it does not look like Mr. Elbaz's work, which was quirkier and married high romance to a powerful core. But it also doesn't represent a drastic break.
It shares a certain vocabulary with what came before (and Ms. Jarrar is careful always to mention Mr. Elbaz in conversation, saying how much admiration she has for him and for what he created), most obviously in its respect for women, but rewritten in her own hand. If she is in any way intimidated by what came before, she isn't showing it. Neither do the clothes.
Heavy on daywear, extending into cocktail ("though I hate that word, 'cocktail,' " Ms. Jarrar said), the Resort collection contains what are clearly meant to be building blocks for the brand: soft jersey blouses with sweeping foulards and blouson sleeves over neatly tailored tux trousers; floral moto/trench jackets; bias-cut sleeveless silk day dresses with a vaguely 1920s air; leather coats. There are shoes, bags and jewelry to go with each look, and a resurrected logo from 1925 was the only clear nod t o the archives.
Photo Another look from the Lanvin pre-collection.
Recently, fashion has become very, well, fashion-y, swinging from 1980s costume party to animal kingdom, and it is interesting to note that Ms. Jarrar seems to understand the value of simplicity; of the elegant gesture, judiciously made. She's not afraid to be understated. Paradoxically, this may make her work stand out amid all the white noise, both on and off the runway, that is sure to fill the air in September.
Between now and then, she says she knows she has a lot of work to do. But she also seems extremely excited to do it. And at a time when many designers are complaining about the amount of work required of them, and the burdens of the system, that sort of enthusiasm for this job is nice to see.
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