Have you seen Hanne Gaby’s techno boiler suit?
The Givenchy bag. The Guiseppe Zanotti biker boots. The Rick Owens leather jacket. Today’s models know the score when it comes to backstage style, their off-duty uniform has the potential to launch their faces far further than the snap snap of cameras on the catwalk.
And yet, rarely do you see a model really breaking out of the mould. Enter Hanne Gaby Odiele – the enfant terrible (in the best possible way) of the backstage area – who routinely turns up to catwalk shows on a skateboard and bounces around with all the mischief of a kid at summer camp. They love her for it. I love her for it.
And now, ever more so. Because, she flipped the model uniform on its head this morning, backstage at Prabal Gurung by wearing – wait for it – a big, wafty silver boiler suit (with, inexplicably a black high-neck Rip Curl surfer’s jersey underneath). ‘It's by DSquared. They made it for Rihanna's tour', she explained. 'When you take a photo of it with a flash, it glows,’ said the model, setting off a chorus of photographer’s flash bulbs. There was no rhyme, no reason, no grandiose fashion credentials to flaunt, it was just for fun. And fun – without HGO around backstage – tends to be wanting.
And she was right, there’s some serious wizardry in that boiler suit – in that split second of a flash going off, it casts black over everything revealing only the blinding moon silver glow of the suit itself.
Attention models, consider the game raised.
