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Mood: Autumn Gold/Fashion/

Creative Exchange

Mood: Autumn Gold

Creative Exchange

Pieter Mulier is sculpting an Alaia world that blends fashion, art and design

@maisonalaia

@maisonalaia

Many great designers strive for simplicity whether that was Cristobal Balenciaga’s quest for a seamless garments; Madame Gres’ draped goddess gowns or Azzedine Alaia’s innovative techno knit dresses that crowned him the king of bodycon back in the 1980s. His successor Pieter Mulier has picked up the baton with a strident focus on concept as well as craft. For the Summer/Fall 24 collection he zoned in on one material. “Everything is made from merino wool. I’ve been working on it for a year, with only a couple of suppliers. It’s based on circles. It’s simple,” he says. “Very simple!”

Yet this is a kind of simple that is never anonymous. Mulier pushes the concept to the limits with deconstructed knitwear, sculptural coats, furry texture skirts that burst into a pouf hem (with matching Bubble cuffs) curvilinear leg denims, fine knit two pieces and leopard patterned tabard tops. The mood is dignified with a flash of leg, or glimpse of torso, and very sensual. The new Decollete boot with a little bow at the toe; the Cone shaped minaudiere and an ingenious snap around Flex belt are some of the high on desire accessories that pull the silhouette together with minimum fuss. Mulier appreciates that the Alaia client likes to be out of the door with zero wardrobe drama.

No alt text has been provided for this image — @maisonalaia

"Yet this is a kind of simple that is never anonymous."

Harriet Quick

With new flagship stores opening in NYC and in Paris, the Richemont owned Maison is flourishing with hard to create ‘hits’ like the Coeur bag and much copied studded ballerinas now contemporary classics. Mulier is further blending the art, fashion and design union and he presented the Winter Spring 2025 collection at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York. The choice of locale New York is symbolic as Azzedine Alaia opened his first store here in the 1980s and showed his collections in 1982 and 2000 in conversation with works by pop art pioneer, Andy Warhol. It is also a city where Pieter Mulier lived and worked for three years while working with Raf Simons at Calvin Klein. “It helped shape who I am today,” he says. It was also the first time that a fashion collection had been staged in the iconic museum’s rotunda. More than a spectacular backdrop, Mulier fashioned his designs in response to the architecture with geometric shapes including circles, squares, spirals wrapping around the form. Double-face cashmere, fine knit, sculpted poplin, and silk taffeta are handled with no zippers or buttons with Mulier paring every element back to its purist form to embrace the directness and ease of American sportswear. Each season is a considered evolution, allowing women to curate and collect pieces that work in conversation over time.

When in Paris make a beeline for the independently run Alaia Foundation to discover ALAÏA/ KURAMATA, Lightness in Creation. Shiro Kuramata and Andrea Branzi were members of the Milan-based Memphis group, founded by Ettore Sottsass in the 1980s. Alaia was an obsessive collector of art, furniture and design with a trove of pieces that now decorate Alaia stores with Mulier’s curation. "Azzedine and Shiro never met, yet I find them quite close. The two of them have brought dreams and wonder to our lives, Azzedine through clothes of unprecedented beauty and Shiro through furniture design like no one has ever imagined,” says co-curator Mieko Kuramata. It is pleasure to witness Mulier reimagining that dream for now.