The Shape of Things to Come

Première Vision is the go-to event for industry desperate to know about the things to come. The Fashion Director of Première Vision Paris, Desolina Suter, explains what changed because of the pandemic and what trends are already emerging.

Subir Ghosh

7 March 2022

4 minutes

Long Story, Cut Short

SS2023 will be both reasonable and energetic, token of a world in which speed and slowness, durability and frivolous trends, natural and artificial, real and virtual will dialogue.
The season invites to exploring landscapes as unknown as stimulating, going from the abyss to the microcosm—all the way to imaginary and immaterial spaces, augmented and virtual realities.
Biomaterials—explained, guaranteed and communicated—will be the basis for a safe and constant request from consumers worldwide.

In December 2021, Première Vision appointed a new Fashion Director: Desolina Suter. Born in Geneva, Switzerland, to Franco-Italian parents, Suter was tasked with coordinating the Première Vision fashion team, handling forward-looking fashion information at a time of important changes to the Première Vision show calendar (in these uncertain, pandemic times).

This involves developing seasonal directions in advance of the shows in collaboration with international experts and professionals, and in association with exhibiting manufacturers. Suter is also responsible for developing new communication channels and tools to transmit Première Vision’s fashion information in an impactful manner to its target audiences: exhibiting manufacturers, designers and creative fashion and accessories brands and more.

The pandemic has changed everything. What about fashion trends? What is the biggest change that you see?
Desolina Suter: COVID-19 has given us—humans and consumers—a chance to consider fashion in a different way. It has opened a wide and public information channel about sustainability which most people never had had, or taken the time to consider. This awareness will no doubt be a powerful motor towards lower, better consumption, calmer, smarter production.

One may observe a sincere need for quality, a rebound of well-made, durable garments but very soon we will also feel a desperate need to bloom, wear happy clothes, feel fresh and constructive.

On the other hand, much has been said about working from home, the possibility to feel comfortable in one’s outfit but also the necessity to feel vital, ready to communicate and open to the world. We have learnt to look good on screen, to use make up and hairdos in a different way.

As a result, in the concept of business wear, attention is given to a mixed fluidity that energetically questions categories and established divisions. Categorisations between sexes are less drastic, boundaries are less distinct with hybrid cross overs between genders.

This fluidity and the fact that business does not necessarily take place in the office but at home, in the garden, on the motorcycle creates a necessity for easier, less rigid, more gender fluid attire.

It’s been two years of sporadic lockdowns. Did it make any difference to the manner in which you gather trends?
Desolina Suter:Generally speaking—the possibility to touch, see, understand the most interesting and beautiful collections allows us to transmit an information based on trusted products, properly communicated and in sintony with the expectations of the market.

Première Vision has national representatives from many countries and areas of the world; they are professionals connected to fashion before production with textile creators, and afterwards with fashion shows and communication events.

Despite the pandemic, our capacity to collect data has not been interrupted. Of course, national and international meetings have taken place online, but fabrics have always been shipped to the PV selection team. As a result, we have been fully able to see new trends, new currents, new expectations emerge. All these will get stronger in the coming seasons.

Recently, our physical meetings have resumed and we are experiencing normality again.

The world has gone more digital during these COVID times and indeed fashion has too. But, fashion is a lot about touch and feel. Has there been any impact on the number of exhibitors for the digital edition?
Desolina Suter:Yes, actually the world of virtual fashion has become super important in these past years. As far as our sector is concerned, I consider crucial the use of virtual instruments as tools for product development.

Nowadays connections between nature and technology are a crucial tool for developing products. This would not have happened without extreme technological developments. In this sense, technology is not experienced as a hindrance but as an asset to be used for a different, more rational, more sustainable kind of production. In order to build a collection or choose fabrics, physical collaboration and presence are and remain essential.

The “born digital consumer” will buy online, but mostly finished products.

What is new in this edition of Première Vision? How do you position yourself in a post-pandemic world (though technically the pandemic is still on)?
SS2023 will be both reasonable and energetic, token of a world in which speed and slowness, durability and frivolous trends, natural and artificial, real and virtual will dialogue.

Beyond simple coexistence, these apparent contradictions will complement one another to cater to new ways of life for consumers and the market itself.

The season invites to exploring landscapes as unknown as stimulating, going from the abyss to the microcosm—all the way to imaginary and immaterial spaces, augmented and virtual realities.

The connection between nature and technology will be an inspiration and an aesthetic guide and an indispensable creative tool.

There are worlds within worlds, and forecasts are just one. It's like making the entire world look similar in different shades of the same (trend). If you have seen one brand's store in one geography, you know what to expect in another. Don't you think trends in some way make the world homogeneous?
I think this omogation concerns both luxury and mass distribution because choices, decisions and development of collections are centralised in single locations before being distributed worldwide.

As a result, we perceive a global homogeneous feeling about these products. However, in recent years, many collections have been initiated that talk about unique connections to a definite location, a voice which regains its proper space. But fashion is desire, and desire has to carry uniqueness.

Right now, the most important motors of desire are durability and a desire to personalise products in such a way that it belongs to us and nobody else.

Do you see changes in the very way that trends are forecast?
Here again the two axes: sustainability and technical creativity are driving the season.
Natural, “historical” fibres like linen but also newly acquired, alternative ones: hemp, nettle, cellulosic fibres from recycled garments, agricultural byproducts.

These processes answer the desire of the market and consumers for a durable, sustainable product, traceable from its very beginning and liberated from its petrochemical origin.

New possibilities of colours are developing on an industrial level. Durable and born right out of nature: inks made of seaweeds, hues made of different qualities of tea…

The deep social and commercial need for a sense of durability will guarantee success to ecological and durable products. Biomaterials—explained, guaranteed and communicated—will be the basis for a safe and constant request from consumers worldwide.

Emerging materials combine recycling and polymerisation: corn amido and castor oil become knitwear, polyurethane free finishings are virtuous proceedings.

Quality in production and fun in design will complete the circle.

Subir Ghosh

SUBIR GHOSH is a Kolkata-based independent journalist-writer-researcher who writes about environment, corruption, crony capitalism, conflict, wildlife, and cinema. He is the author of two books, and has co-authored two more with others. He writes, edits, reports and designs. He is also a professionally trained and qualified photographer.