‘31 Rue Cambon’ Review Tom Sachs’s Handmade Haute Couture
By Brian P. Kelly
A few blocks north of Canal Street, where tourists pick up fake designer bags for a fraction of what the genuine articles retail for, another kind of luxury mimicry has emerged. Tucked in an unassuming building on Centre Street is “31 Rue Cambon,” a “Chanel pop-up” from the artist and designer Tom Sachs. Inside are some of the couture brand’s most iconic looks, rendered in plywood and acrylic paint and neatly arranged in the sparsely populated layout used by boutiques to let visitors know that if they need to ask for a price they really shouldn’t be shopping there. Are these garments forgeries? Replicas? Dupes? Homages?
Yes, yes, yes and yes. In short, this collection is many layered, like Mr. Sachs himself. An artist whose own creations are unambiguously handmade, he is also obsessed with the mass production of McDonald’s and the scientific exactitude of NASA manufacturing. In his work it’s easy to find a critique of consumer culture, but he has also collaborated with Nike on shoes sought by sneakerheads.
