Balenciaga designs Bernie Sanders-inspired collection

By

Kate Dingwall

Published
Jan 22, 2017

Balenciaga, under the leadership of wunderkind designer Demna Gvasalia, staged its Fall/Winter 2017 menswear runway during Paris Fashion Week on Thursday. Gvasalia, known for his disruptive collections for both Balenciaga and his own label Vetements, drew inspiration for some of the looks from the election campaign of U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders.

Gvasalia’s latest collection for Balenciaga featured an almost identical version of the Bernie Sanders campaign logo, the word “Bernie” with two red and blue wavy stripes below, along with the year. The reworked Balenciaga logo uses the same colors, design and font, but replaces the Vermont senator’s name with that of the fashion house, which embellishes bomber jackets, down-filled scarves, pins, and even the model’s manicures.

Gvsalia has not made a statement about the sampling of Sanders campaign artwork. However, the U.S. politician, asked by New York Magazine’s The Cut to review the collection, responded with both humor and social commentary: “Look, I know I use this phrase a lot, but this feels very ’wealthiest one-tenth of one percent’ to me. If I were going to go break up the big banks, this is the disguise I’d do it in, believe you me. I’d sneak in there and hide my bank-hammer in those big pockets so they’d never see it coming!”

Asked to comment on the bomber jacket embroidered with the “Balenciaga 2017” logo, he immediately recognized the inspiration. “This logo seems familiar to me. Not sure why. Can’t put my finger on it.”

This is the third collection with Gvasalia at the helm after being appointed as creative director of Balenciaga in October, 2015.