OPINION | Is glamor back or is it all a mirage?

Editor’s note: Mari Rodríguez Ichaso has been a contributor to Vanidades magazine for several decades. She is a specialist in fashion, travel, gastronomy, art, architecture and entertainment, film producer and style columnist for CNN en Español. The opinions expressed in this column are solely his own. Read more opinion pieces at cnne.com/opinion.

(CNN Spanish) – Yes, it is true, the passage of time changes, erases and blurs many things, but others have a second life. And among the many things that “return” in 2021 –surviving a year and a half of life under COVID19– is the face-to-face celebration of Haute Couture Fashion Week, Haute couture, in Paris.

And with those shows, which have taken place in beautiful places like the Rodin Museum or the new Bourse de Commerce-Pinault Collection, comes the return to a more optimistic life, more full of beauty … and, with it, a boost! much needed to the world economy!

And why is it important to return to the Paris fashion shows and to have the public attendance again?

First of all, because it is the official return of an industry that employs thousands of people around the world. And it is a return to a greater normalcy after a year and a half of confinement and prohibitions. A return to a life that we had almost forgotten!

And you wonder if there was something different and new about these Paris Fashion Week shows?

And I love telling you yes!

How were the very exclusive haute couture shows – the most important in fashion that only take place in Paris twice a year (independent of the Pret-a-Porter shows, in New York, London, Milan and Paris) – and how They also coincided with the red carpet of the Cannes Film Festival – which had not been held in 2020 either – it was a double return to glamor, to luxury, to a world that had disappeared. A return to beautiful things and also to the most extravagant and exaggerated fashion. Amazing!

And celebrities from around the world participated in the audience and on the catwalks: Carlota Casiraghi with her husband and mother, Princess Carolina of Monaco; models from all eras, like Gigi and Bella Hadid, even the most veteran, Carla Bruni, Christy Turlington and Amber Valletta; actresses, such as Salma Hayek, Marion Cotillard, Isabelle Huppert, Helen Mirren, and the ever-present-in-everything, Victoria Beckham.

A friend recently asked me if all this is not a bit frivolous when there are so many problems in the world, and pictures of American soldiers, at the end of World War II, queuing at the Chanel boutique came to mind – in newly liberated Paris – to buy Chanel No. 5 for their waiting girlfriends and wives in America!

The world cannot be all suffering because sadness would paralyze us, and it is also important to remember once again that, both in the fashion industry, as well as in jewelry and the world of cinema, thousands and thousands of people work, and therefore almost 2 years have experienced a very deep economic crisis.

In addition, we all need an incentive in our lives … beautiful things … more moments Light… And the illusion of a more beautiful and fun life. Something that makes us smile! And this exists in fashion, in movies, in the magazines that tell us celebrity gossip. A frivolous world perhaps, but part of the life that we had almost lost.

This return to the runways comes hand in hand with the future of fashion and its many changes. For example, online purchases – which multiplied during the pandemic and helped many businesses – will continue to be very important. Even expensive brands that had never wanted to sell themselves online because they didn’t think it was part of their image.

I also dare to predict that – according to the wonderful jewels we saw on the red carpet at the Cannes Film Festival – expensive jewelery and watches will be sold. There is a desire to shine, to look as glamorous as possible, and in these collections of couture – like those of Armani Privé, Balenciaga and Dior – even the fabrics had a blinding shine. Just as we will take care of ourselves more, both beauty, nutrition and health, because we are loving each other much more! And this is good news.