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Marc Jacobs: She Wore A Chinese Ribbon

John Ford, for whom, ironically, character and not attire mattered most in the creation of his canon, would have loved the latest collection from Marc Jacobs , a wacky yet wonderful vision that recalled a Sunday afternoon walk to service in a prairie town; albeit one were the churchgoers boasted tailors with a sophisticated understanding of Chinese embroidery and enough money to pay for large quantities of passementerie.

But the key look in the Spring 2009 show Monday was a series of padded Chinoiserie wrap coats in erratic pattern prints, which enveloped 53 of the world’s best models. “Cracked, fragmented, broken,” was Jacobs’ own description of the coats, and one that also described the pendants in plastic, copper, fur and wire that looped around many necks.

Jacobs’ penchant for the absurd was evident from the opening look that like many passages was topped by a squashed straw hat. Marc’s other bizarre gifts were the strange yet strikingly beautiful truncated tailcoats in Lurex hues that came with Napoleonic lapels in mustard, or the glittering jacquard pants paired with Western shirts, which despite the odd combination was surprisingly successful.

The show was staged on plain wooden runway divided down the middle by huge freestanding mirrors. The collection rifled through a dozen different influences from Perry Ellis to Yves Saint Laurent, from prairie schoolmarm to penniless Grey Gardens heiress and incorporated much passementerie, using it on earrings, headbands and jacket trims as well as high heel shoes covered with the material.

There are some who say that Jacobs is a brilliant stylist, since some many of his collection consist of mingling existing elements into something new, and creating innovative silhouettes and cuts. However Jacobs’ work is more like hip hop music, based on sampling “found” fundamentals and forging them into something genuinely novel. That aesthetic was underscored by the great Frederic Sanchez soundtrack, a remixed version of Gershwin’s great symphony “Rhapsody in Blue,” itself an early example of sampling, since it mixes the forms and instruments of classic music with the cacophonous sounds of the modern city.

And, as the show built to the finale, the faintly wacky morphed into the elegantly sexy with a series of black and green drop dead gorgeous cocktails, great first date looks that finished with three splendidly cut powder pink columns. And the movie, which had opened with scenes reminiscent of Ford's "She Wore a Yellow Ribbon" ended with the cine noir glam of Orson Welles.

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