Spring's Fashion Ads: Highlights and Flop!

From: Markus Ebner

1. We love fashion ad campaigns at Achtung, particularly when placed in our magazine, but especially for their powerful visual language. They can radically improve a brand’s image, i.e. Chloe’s recent campaigns are crisp, exact, while their runway shows were so-so; or decree a directional stance, like at Balenciaga. This season, it turns out much of our favorite stuff has been shot without a creative director, and with the designer calling the shots. A new trend? It remains to be seen; but here is our ranking of our favorite five campaigns.

2. Lanvin by Steven Meisel

3. Top Spot: Lanvin
   
   Photographer: Steven Meisel
   
   Art Direction: Alber Elbaz
   
   Model: Iselin Steiro & Kinga Rajzak
   
   Lanvin is the one collection every season guaranteed to bring its audience to their feet, injecting real excitement into the Paris schedule. Alber Elbaz is a show master and a real designer, a tailor and an image man. In his hands, even an H&M collaboration looks fine. And so there is nothing better than to see this lover of disco music and the ‘70s channel Guy Bourdin for his latest ad campaign. Working with Steven Meisel, considered the best living fashion photographer, Elbaz has captured some of the runway magic familiar to his shows in this campaign. Fashion for fashion’s sake, there is nothing better than that. Meisel depicts scenes of two super chic women battling each other for their clothes. To have the look is all that matters.
   
   
   

4. Balenciaga by Steven Meisel

5. Second Place: Balenciaga
   
   Photographer: Steven Meisel
   
   Art Direction: Nicolas Ghesquiere
   
   Model: Gisele Bundchen
   
   Balenciaga is the only fashion brand, which consistently puts forth an avant-garde image both in its shows and advertising. Moreover, it’s the only house where the runway showings heavy focus on casting is in synch with its own campaigns. This is a brave and rare act as fashion ads are intended to sell the clothes and hence often play it safe. For this season Steven Meisel and Nicolas Ghesquiere - yes, Ghesquiere himself art directs the campaign - have chosen Balenciaga veteran Gisele Bundchen to star in a beautiful campaign which juxtaposes a cool fashion image with a Diane Arbus scenario-type picture of a disheveled Gisele in a forest with a male model behind her resembling a ghost which haunts her. What we like especially about this ad that it is in the fine school of French maverick art director Marc Ascoli who always juxtaposed a fashion image with something more troubling and meaningful in his groundbreaking campaigns for Jil Sander and Yohji Yamamoto in the late 80’s and early 90’s. It still works even if Marc Ascoli is hardly working anymore.

6. Celine by Juergen Teller

7. Third Place: Celine
   
   Photographer: Juergen Teller
   
   Art Direction: Phoebe Philo
   
   Model: Stella Tennant & Dario Werbovy
   
   Celine and its reinvention through Phoebe Philo stormed onto the fashion scene, and after only a few seasons the out of date LVMH house is one of the hottest labels around. This has also to do with Juergen Teller. The photographer was a long-time collaborator of Helmut Lang and is now teaming up with Philo to bring back his to-the-point simplicity for fashion advertising, first championed with Lang. Celine collections also bring to mind the severe tailoring and stark minimalism of the Lang era, as Teller refreshingly captures Stella Tennant and Daria Werbovy clutching skateboards in Celine’s arts and craft print silk summer collection pieces. Teller is always at the forefront with his fashion-refusing imagery though his partnership with Philo produces a far chicer take. It’s notable that this is the Celine third campaign which makes do without a big name art director, a task split between the designer with the photographer. Sounds like a smart new trend?
   

8. Longchamp by Patrick Demarchelier

9. The Worst: Longchamp
   
   Photographer: Patrick Demarchelier
   
   Model: Audrey Marnay
   
   It all started so well for Longchamp, a forgotten French bag maker. By enlisting Kate Moss shot by Mert Alas and Marcus Piggot they instantaneously created a buzz in the fashion world. Next to Kate Moss was then new model Sasha Pivorova and it all looked so iconic and cool. Now, they have gone back to their French roots and Demarchelier lenses a tired looking former star model Audrey Marnay in a setting that looks so faux and contrived that it hurts. Do we really believe that Marnay is on a boat exploring the Asian Pacific or Club Med? Heavily borrowing from Hermes visual language that takes viewers on a journey, the new campaign fails to instill any excitement or desire. What a surprise, as veteran Demarchelier usually aces his assignments.
   
   
   
   

10. Jil Sander by Willy Vanderperre

11. Our number 4: Jil Sander
    
    Photographer: Willy Vanderperre
    
    Model: Daria Strokous
    
    Though they have brought together some of the most avant-garde minds working in fashion today, namely Raf Simons, stylist Olivier Rizzo and photographer Willy Vanderpierre, the Jil Sander campaigns have taken time to gain traction. From the beginning, Simons has opted to work with his old friends, a couple also in life. But the first campaigns while admirable, never quite captured the revolutionary spirit of Simons. One was also surprised to see Simons use the same fetish models of so many other designers, namely Natasha Poly. After a runway show of mass proportions and bright colors – possibly the best show for the Spring season period - the new campaign nails it by boldly using lighting to its maximum effect. All that’s left is the fantastic silhouette and the neon colors while the model seamlessly blends into the white background.
    

12. Hermes by Nick Knight -- All images courtesy of the featured brands

13. And number 5: Hermes
    
    Photographer: Nick Knight
    
    Art Direction: Philippe Chanet
    
    Model: Jacquelyn Jablonsky
    
    Nick Knight has long shaped the fashion photography landscape. He’s the gentleman in the Savile Row suit who uses lighting like nobody else. His images never look to painting or past photographer’s work for inspiration but are solely built around his skills and fantasy. Really, never ever does he rip off someone else’s style, which is so uncommon in fashion advertising. For Hermes current Spring campaign, Knight zeroes in on his famous blurry color contrast work which is even seen in the here mentioned Jil Sander campaign. Fantastically colorful silhouettes smear across the pages of the most important fashion magazines as Hermes scores a coup by bringing back Knight’s work to push forward the brand’s craftsmen’s values to new heights.