The Height of Fashion

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In the worlds of style and air travel, one runway has always inspired the other.

By Tim Blanks

ILLUSTRATION: HORT

It’s hard to pick a high point in the career of the re­cently retired fashion designer Valentino, though his fall 2006 menswear collection stands out as particularly memo­rable. At the show, Valentino paid homage to The V.I.P.s, the 1963 camp classic that not only starred his most famous client, Elizabeth Taylor, but also presented to the world the jet set: the tiny, privileged coterie that the dictionary would come to define as wealthy and fashionable people who travel widely and frequently for pleasure.

In the collection, Valentino imagined his travellers in handcrafted crocodile coats, shearling-lined blousons in mushroom suede, satin jackets in creamy cappuccino, and silk suits. Deluxe dressing up might seem like a curious response to the utilitarianism of modern air travel, but that was scarcely what Valentino was reflecting. Rather, I think he was intent on evoking the kind of magic and glamour associated with an earlier time, before air travel became more a part of our work than a means to get away from it.

It’s not only Valentino who dresses his frequent fliers in precious and beautiful garb. Gimlet-eyed pragmatist Michael Kors also envisages a clientele draped in deluxe-ury as they board their flight. Since even before 1958, when Brioni showed its menswear collection on a plane, air travel has inspired fashion; Valentino was returning to the roots of this relationship, reclaiming travel as a fabulous privilege and an escape from everyday life.

But Valentino’s collection was about more than air travel. The jet set has always been a state of mind. Someone once called its members “supersonic gypsies” – a tribe of nomads traversing the globe at great speed. The notion underscores a mobility that was as much mental as physical for the actors, artists, authors, filmmakers and beautiful people – not to mention the tycoons who would underwrite the airfare. Yes, there were parties, but there was also a supersonic exchange of ideas and influences – a shedding of boundaries. That existed even before there were jets to ferry a privileged few around the globe. But today, when reality has been replaced by virtuality, this kind of borderless communication seems even more apt.

It’s no wonder that the jet set walks among us once more. Valentino and his cohorts are regilding travel with the lustre of privilege, with a view to restoring the mindset that accompanies it. Given the democratization of luxury that has characterized the last decade on every level – from food to fashion, holidays to home interiors – it was inevitable that there’d be a swing in the other direction. Today travelling is easy; the challenge is reimagining the experience, and understanding that the journey – and the state of mind – is as important as the destination.

Write to us: letters@enroutemag.net

As host of CBC’s Fashion File for 17 years, Tim Blanks interviewed countless fashion luminaries, including Karl Lagerfeld, Giorgio Armani and Ralph Lauren.

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