londonENGLAND
sarahMOWER: it takes an incredible designer to probe the live anxieties of this scary moment and yet still come up with a wearable fashion collection, and that person is hussein chalayan. his show literally ended with a crash: the live smashing of dozens of wine glasses lined up along a pseudo-bar inset in the back of the set. while that happened, the stage was occupied by a circle of girls standing on a revolving dais, wearing molded-latex dresses that appeared to be frozen in aerodynamic motion. each dress was hand-painted with images of crushed cars. "it's about the speed in our lives and how it can only result in a crash," chalayan explained, adding that the prints, which included number plates, car handles, and fenders, were "taken from pictures of car graves." the extraordinary talent chalayan has is his ability to project something emotionally and politically pertinent onto his runway without making it oppressively doom-laden.