August, 13th, 2012

Antwerp . Paris | Haider Ackermann Métaphore Couturier

The designer Haider Ackermann and eight looks from his fall 2011 collection. Haider Ackermann says the words “far away” as though they were a whisper in the wind or a rustle in the grass. It’s his woman he is talking about, an amalgam of his memories of a childhood in Africa: noble Nigerian robes, a clink of tribal jewelry, the Muslim chador framing the face, women wrapped in swathes of fabric with the body undulating beneath.

A distant woman’s approach is a neat metaphor for a designer whose decade-plus history — since attending the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Antwerp, interning with John Galliano and setting up his own label in 2003 — is the antithesis of “fast” fashion. The trajectory of this Colombian-born designer has not been exactly slow, but measured. Haider Ackermann is reaching for the firmament not because of la vague but because what he stands for — a gentle approach to a woman’s body, fine fabrics and a non-show-offy attitude — corresponds with the current fashion mood.

L’Éditor