In Da Miu Miu Club

Miu Miu has permanently ensconced their shows at the Palais D’Iena in Paris since… I don’t remember when, so travelling to some far-out location for their resort (or croisière as the folks at Miu Miu like to call it) show was never going to be on the cards.  Entering the space last night, and beneath the seedy clear plastic stripping, industrial rave scaffolding and neon lights was the Miu Miu Club, a starkly different affair from the Miu Miu London club from a few years back.  In fact from start to finish, it was a very different affair from most Miu Miu events, where plush carpet, a few quiet drinks and unabashed girliness normally dominate.  There was a bit of plush carpeting in one of the adjoining rooms where the debut of their first perfume was played out with a muse, a kitten and the prettiest of powder blue bottles (Quickfire verdict on the fragrance?  Fresh, sweet but not overly so).

Beyond though and Miuccia was setting us up for a rager with Prada sound meister Frederic Sanchez, tech house DJ Craig Richards and American producer Seth Troxler on the decks.  RuPaul’s Drag Race and Club Sandwich divas and queens mingled amongst the guests.  Despite the faux “reserved” seating signs, the best view in the house wasn’t from those VIP suede couches.  Instead, we all gawked up at the raised scaffolding platform where the most banging of Miu Miu remixes strutted out – both on the soundtrack and on the clothes.  You could spy a bit of S/S 10 swallow and nudie prints, a rehash of the S/S 12 cowboy boots, the Western-style inlaid jackets, the metallic leathers, the crystal embroderies – all recognisable Miu Miu-isms.  But it was all slashed, cut and pasted in a way that felt more energetically menacing than the Miu Miu of late.  The DIY fronds of fabric hanging off the ears.  The Miu Miu club flyer plastered over skirts.  The prints depicting dancing legs.  No simpering pretty-in-pink Miu Miu girlie girl here.  This was a cheeky wild child raver ready to rip up the past and mash it up differently.

Perhaps that was down to that injected whiff of London Blitz Kids or Malcolm McLaren and Dame Viv’s early 80s collections.  It was a remix that might even have surpassed the original, and it was one that fell right in line with how Miuccia summarised her last Miu Miu collection.  “It’s about fun and fashion!” was what she uttered back in March.  This resort collection, and the subsequent afterparty WAS wholly about fun.  But there was nothing throwaway about it all.  The post party headache lingered on today and the clothes will endure some rambunctious times when they hit the rails a few months down the line.