Fashion & Style: Here's Why People Left the Valentino Couture Show in Tears

Céline Dion wasn’t the only one crying.

Wednesday’s Valentino spring 2019 haute couture show dominated social media in a way that fashion’s most labor-intensive (and expensive) gowns rarely do — and not just because Naomi Campbell was practically topless. The show was a dramatic display of fashion-as-art that, quite

literally, brought showgoers to tears.

Céline Dion sat front row, wiping teardrops from her eyes. Perhaps it was because "The First Time I Ever Saw You" by Roberta Flack, which was her first-dance song with her late husband, René Angélil, soundtracked the show, but also perhaps because the collection was that beautiful. Likely, it was a combination of the two. InStyle editor-in-chief Laura Brown shared Dion’s sentiment: “Utter beauty. I cried. And I was far from the only one,” she wrote on Instagram. "A wonderfully life-enhancing couture show," wrote Harper's Bazaar UK editor-in-chief Justine Picardie, summing up what most attendees were thinking. "It’s very rare to see a collection that evokes such collective emotion in an audience — but this was one of those occasions that brought everyone together, in the knowledge that we are very lucky indeed to witness such creativity, combined with a real warmth and authenticity...bravo Pierpaolo Piccioli." It was, as the brand called the show on Instagram, “emotional synesthesia,” indeed.

Described by the house as “merging between fantasy and reality” the 65-look collection was comprised of feathered capes and organza gowns and headpieces that resembled rose bushes that were given incredible, wondrous names like “centaurea” and “anemone” by the Valentino seamstresses, per Piccioli’s request. It was artful, decadent, and moving — and not just because the pieces felt so other-worldly that it’s hard to imagine they really exist. It was because, as Piccioli said: “Valentino today has to be more inclusive. I want the couture to be relevant for today. Not for old times.”

But how does one make a gown that takes hundreds — sometimes thousands — of hours to make, a gown that can only be created bespoke and often costs upwards of $10,000, feel “inclusive?” It requires looking beyond the dresses to the women who wear them.


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