Bouchra Jarrar Couture Fall 2015

Bouchra Jarrar’s understated couture took a turn toward the boudoir for fall with bra tops, filmy skirts and luminescent silks.

First published WWD

Bouchra Jarrar packed away her perfectos and explored more tender fashion territory this season: the boudoir.

Pastel colors, luminescent silks, bra tops and filmy skirts fanning over girdlelike underthings were the latest propositions from the little couturier that could, staging her 12th high-fashion show as an independent, targeting a clientele still numbering barely in the double digits.

Jarrar’s couture is of an understated ilk built on bespoke fabrics, including meaty silk jacquards in pajama stripes and her trademark tweeds, here in textured bands of lingerie pinks and black, the looped chenille positioned at the shoulders of her minimalist vests and V-neck shifts.

Likewise, the colors were extremely subtle, tweaked to the designer’s exacting specifications: The python bomber jacket dyed a midnight shade of navy; the icy blue trenchcoat tinted with red and yellow to give it a more steely cast, like the slate sky that hovered over her open-air show, staged in the cloister of the Lycée Henri-IV.

The shapes were immediately understandable : Languid, high-waisted tuxedo pants; mannish robes; and her trademark sleeveless jackets and trenches. “It’s important for me that couture is visually accessible,” she said during a preview.

While realistic daywear is Jarrar’s forte, her evening gowns were exceptional, simple slip or wrap styles toughened up with D-rings and straps of metallic leather. Additional drama came from draping — beguiling as a sashlike lapel on tuxedo vests — and from the embellishments.

Dense rows of jutting feathers trimmed lapels on tuxedo jackets, and gave an exotic flare to Jarrar’s fetish harness tops. Transparent tube beads and tortoise-shell-shade sequins also approximated fur, the only thing remotely wintry about this dreamy and delicate collection.

by Miles Socha