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When fashion’s finest all flocked to London’s Royal Albert Hall on Monday evening for the 2022 Fashion Awards, Rita Ora decided to amp up her beauty look on the red carpet.
First, she turned heads in a completely sheer red cutout dress from London-based Albanian designer Nensi Dojaka’s Spring/Summer 2023 ready-to-wear collection with a red G-string beneath and Aquazzura sandals. But Ora brought her look to the next level with fish scale facial prosthetics placed around her eye. They extended from the inside of her brow line to the crest of her cheekbone, courtesy of British makeup artist Isamaya Ffrench.
Ora finished off her glam with rose-stained lips and a luminescent glow, with her honey blonde tresses styled in polished waves.
The innovative beauty look called to mind a landmark moment in fashion history from Alexander McQueen’s “Plato’s Atlantis” collection shown during his Spring/Summer 2010 runway presentation (the first-ever live-streamed fashion show). A celebration and plea to salvage the natural world, the renegade designer gave his models fantastical, sea creature facial prosthetics to punctuate the theme. Speaking to the future evolution of the human form, McQueen was inspired by the notion of an ecological collapse.
“Equipping his models with prosthetic face enhancements, he offered release from the dystopian and mechanized reality of the 21st century and a return to the primeval geneses of life,” said Claire Wilcox in Robert Fairer’s tome Alexander McQueen Unseen.
With bulging prosthetics at the cheekbones and brow line, models sported shimmering and icy-metallic platinum glam, bleached eyebrows, and pale lips to complete the look of an underwater being.
In the end, “Plato’s Atlantis” was McQueen’s last fashion show before his untimely death in February, 2010. Emphasizing the importance of treasuring the earth in all its beauty, McQueen bookended his legendary life and career with a poignant message.
