Marc Jacobs has never been more relatable than the time he once said, “I just worry that the people I look up to will say, ‘That’s not good.’” We Vogue Runway reviewers experience the same kind self-doubt that grips designers in the lead-up to their shows, only ours comes after those shows, often the wee-est hours of the night as a production manager back home taps her foot waiting ever so patiently for our copy. On the occasion of Runway’s 10th anniversary, our critics past and present reflect on our own finest reviews, the ones that made us think, that’s not just good, it’s great.
JW Anderson’s spring 2021 Show in a Box.
Photo: Courtesy of JW Anderson
Playing with paper dolls.
Photo: Courtesy of JW Anderson
Low-fi, analog, interactive, brilliant.
Photo: Courtesy of JW Anderson
JW Anderson, spring 2021 ready-to-wear
The phenomenon of big-brand spectaculars blew up in the last decade—360- degree “experiential” mega-content shows, hand in hand with the mobile phone and ballooning social media. We’ve documented it all at Vogue Runway.
Then shows came to a dead halt during COVID. The industry was initially panic-struck, with no idea how to respond. Except, that is, for Jonathan Anderson. My favorite memory is the knock on my door from a masked delivery person that came on the morning of September 28, 2020. There on my mat was his JW Anderson Show in a Box.
It was a set of miniature paper-doll models wearing his spring ’21 collection. I raced to my computer, fired up Zoom—and there was Jonathan, isolated in his studio, giving me instructions about how to prop them up against the funny photoshopped cardboard backdrop he’d sent.
It was a lo-fi, analog, interactive delight. A brilliantly innovative idea which showed Anderson’s talent for creating solutions, even with very little—and making it fun. “I think we will remember these times”, he remarked amongst the conversation I relayed in my review.
He’d completely understood the psychological importance of human connection, stirring up delight and playfulness in the face of the fear and the boredom the world was living through. (He came up with more devices for Loewe as well). Being excellent in a crisis proved the mettle of Anderson’s agile intelligence as one of the great fashion communicators of our age. I count his Show in a Box is a tiny but historic treasure; a souvenir from a talent on his way to the very top. —Sarah Mower
