Look of the Week: Jenna Ortega’s steel dress has a very human touch

EDITOR’S NOTE: Featuring the good, the bad and the ugly, ‘Look of the Week’ is a regular series dedicated to unpacking the most talked about outfit of the last seven days.

From a certain handmade $50 million white-gold bra to the latest red carpet look worn by Jenna Ortega, metal couture is everywhere this week.

At first glance, Ortega’s fitted bodice, fringe skirt and W-shaped bustier looked like something you might find hanging in Cher’s closet. But the gown, designed by Elias Matso, was fashioned almost entirely out of hand-cut steel flat and spiral boning — structural components usually found in the guts of a corset or hoop skirt. It looked as if Ortega herself had been magnetized and sent naked into a steel factory.

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She wore the dress to the New York film premiere of “Klara and the Sun,” an adaptation of Kazuo Ishiguro’s 2021 novel by the same name. In it, Ortega plays an eager and altruistic solar-powered robot, or “Artificial Friend” called Klara. “He’s been holding onto this dress for me and it’s perfect,” Ortega told People magazine of Matso’s design. “It’s very fitting for the film.”

Ortega and her stylist, Enrique Melendez, would have had plenty of options to choose from for this method dressing moment. Luxury fashion — an industry that justifies its price tag through the promise of human craftsmanship — has enjoyed nodding to robots, and in particular fem-bots, for decades. There was Thierry Mugler’s Machinemensch suit from 1995, recently brought out of retirement by Zendaya , named after the revolutionary sculpted robot costume Brigitte Helm wears in Fritz Lang’s seminal 1927 movie “Metropolis.” In 2024, Schiaparelli’s spring couture collection used technological waste salvaged from the 2000’s, from discarded circuit boards to Nokia cell phones. Creative director Daniel Roseberry cheekily likened the electronics to “vintage fabrics.” And then there was the landmark spring 1999 Alexander McQueen show, where automated robotic arms spray-painted model Shalom Harlow’s white dress into oblivion.

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Today, tech-fashion is a much more sobering prospect than a fantasy robot suit with exposed butt checks. Meta has collaborated with Kylie Jenner and Ray-Ban to make their controversial AI glasses more aesthetically pleasing, and real robots are closer than ever before to the world of fashion. This summer, Unitree Robotics’ humanoid dancers were meme-ified a million times over when they performed at Vogue World in Milan, with designers such as Miuccia Prada and Alessandro Michele looking particularly disgruntled in the front row. At Shangai Fashion Week earlier this month, Unitree’s robots showed up again — this time modeling wedding dresses on the runway for Chinese brand The Atelier.

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For it to work, or at least entice rather than unnerve, tech-fashion has to have an analog element. Roseberry repurposed the outdated materials of an early aughts IT department, while McQueen’s robotic arms were borrowed from a factory where they were used to paint cars — hardly super high-tech advancements threatening species - level extinction. Matso’s gown, too, though resembling a motherboard’s insides, was just dressmaker’s metal. Both the designer and Ortega emphasized the people that put it all together. Matso nodded to the “many blisters, rebuilds, failed trials” and “helping hands.” Ortega put it more simply: “It’s hand-made, human-made, a lot of effort.”

编者按： “每周最佳造型”是一个定期系列，旨在剖析过去七天中最受关注的穿搭，内容涵盖好的、坏的和丑陋的造型。

从价值 5000 万美元的手工白金胸罩到 Jenna Ortega 最新在红毯上亮相的造型，本周金属时装随处可见。

乍一看，奥尔特加的紧身胸衣、流苏裙摆和W形胸衣，就像是雪儿衣橱里的那种款式。但这条由埃利亚斯·马索设计的礼服，几乎完全由手工切割的扁平螺旋钢骨制成——这些结构部件通常用于紧身胸衣或裙撑的内部。看起来就像奥尔特加本人被磁铁吸引，然后赤身裸体地被送进了钢铁厂。

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她穿着这条裙子出席了电影《克拉拉与太阳》在纽约的首映礼。这部电影改编自石黑一雄2021年出版的同名小说。在片中，奥尔特加饰演一位热情无私的太阳能机器人，或者说是“人工智能朋友”克拉拉。“他一直为我保留着这条裙子，它太完美了，”奥尔特加在接受《人物》杂志采访时谈到马特索的设计时说道，“它非常符合这部电影的风格。”

奥尔特加和她的造型师恩里克·梅伦德斯在这次“方法派”着装体验中有很多选择。奢侈时尚——这个以精湛工艺为卖点的行业——几十年来一直热衷于向机器人，尤其是女性机器人致敬。例如，蒂埃里·穆勒1995年设计的“机器人”（Machinemensch）套装，最近被赞达亚重新演绎，其灵感来源于弗里茨·朗1927年的经典电影《大都会》中布里吉特·赫尔姆所穿的革命性雕塑机器人服装。2024年，夏帕瑞丽的春季高级定制系列使用了2000年代回收的科技废料，从废弃的电路板到诺基亚手机。创意总监丹尼尔·罗斯伯里戏谑地将这些电子产品比作“复古面料”。还有 1999 年春季 Alexander McQueen 的标志性时装秀，秀场上，自动机械臂将模特 Shalom Harlow 的白色连衣裙喷漆得面目全非。

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如今，科技时尚远比那些露臀的奇幻机器人套装更令人清醒。Meta公司与凯莉·詹娜和雷朋合作，使其备受争议的AI眼镜更具美感，而真正的机器人也比以往任何时候都更接近时尚界。今年夏天，优利特机器人公司的人形舞者在米兰Vogue World的表演中被无数次恶搞，坐在前排的缪西娅·普拉达和亚历山德罗·米歇尔等设计师显得格外不悦。本月初的上海时装周上，优利特的机器人再次亮相——这次是为中国品牌The Atelier走秀，展示婚纱。

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科技时尚要想成功，或者至少能吸引人而不是令人不安，就必须包含一些模拟元素。罗斯伯里重新利用了2000年代初IT部门的过时材料，而麦昆的机械臂则借自一家汽车喷漆厂——这算不上什么威胁物种灭绝的高科技。马特索的礼服虽然看起来像主板内部结构，但实际上只是裁缝用的金属。设计师和奥尔特加都强调了幕后人员的重要性。马特索提到了“无数次的失败尝试、反复的修改和帮助”，以及“无数的援助之手”。奥尔特加则更简洁地表达道：“这是手工制作的，凝聚了人心，倾注了大量心血。”