BALENCIAGA SS 09 AD CASTING: ADVANCED AND AUDACIOUS

Balenciaga SS 09 invite via nytimes.com/themoment

There is a great expression the kids on the streets are using these days. They're saying "Real talk" when they wish to cut the b.s, get to the point and hand you some realness. So to jack that street trope- let's just say- real talk... the way Balenciaga is putting together its crew of signature faces for SS 09 is really exciting in its audaciousness. The Hiss Squad tells me Nicholas Ghesquiere was in town this weekend personally meeting girls all the better to filter those choices for what promises to be a breakthrough campaign. The interesting challenge on this particular collection is the very insular and hermetic nature of the clothes as well as the multi-facted details sparked off by the shoes and bags. It was a difficult collection to digest and one wonders how the photographer will open up the cramped runway dialogue from last October onto a multi-girl, multi page format in the glossies. In a season which saw more and more designers sinking back into a vocabulary of predictable banalities, the chance to shoot this particular collection must feel like a major gift . It makes perfect sense that this would be the Balenciaga collection that would be sold back to the market with a fashion focus via the models, the first time in a year that has happened. What is especially invigorating is that the girls circled off represent a personal and peculiar set of preferences as opposed to the pre-packaged, politically driven choices that will populate other campaigns this seasons. I already love the mixture of the very beautiful girls with ( as promised by a previous TI tipsters) the unorthodox choices. There are girls in that mix who barely set foot on anyone's runway this season as well as girls who are riding all those expected covers. Of course out of respect I can't print a list of names , precisely because one never knows who may or may not make that final cut. Suffice it to say, in the model-making sweepstakes, the Balenciaga brand seems rocketing this season to that status of most directional casting of the season. Waiting with bated breath for those first images in January 2009.