image source: nytimesArmani has designed the trajes de luces (suit of lights) for Cayetano Rivera Ordoñez, a Spanish bullfighter who has also modeled for Armani. Rivera will wear the costume on September 6 for the Corrida Goyesca in Ronda, Spain. Bullfighting has been a tradition in Rivera's family since the early 1900s- he is the 7th member of his family to become a bullfighter.
The design for the matador's costume has remained within strict bounds of tradition. It takes 20-50 people about a month to create one suit-- all sequins and beads are hand-sewn & the intricate designs are hand-embroidered. the Montera (hat) takes 40 days to complete and is made of hand-knotted & frayed silk. (for more, see: Illuminating the 'Suit of Lights')
all images: AP/Reuters/Getty at daylife.com
Rivera's costume will be in Armani's signature color greige (mixture of grey and beige) and adorned with silver embroidery, crystals and sequins.
Capote (cape)
images source: sfilate
by Lucy McCauley:
I walked into the ring and thought of bullfights I'd been to in Sevilla, years before: The sound of tinny horns and snare drums, the scent of wine and black tobacco infusing the spectator stands. The suits of lights in glimmering gold and black, or electric blue and pink. The matador's white smile and flushed cheek. But also, the bull, sprung from its pen onto that ring of orange sand, facing death.
There in the Ronda ring, I remembered the contradiction of that morbid Spanish ritual: During the season of the corrida -- the bullfight -- there is no end of partying. The corrida is the reason for the fiestas, and the fiestas define, somehow, the death in the afternoon at the corrida. It is a contrast echoed as well in flamenco, in the insistent swirl of the dancer's skirt against the music's mournful key.
