Marine Serre‘s co-ed spring-summer 2024 line-up was pretty loaded with musicians: Teyana Taylor, Noah Cyrus, Miguel, Brooke Candy, and Sevdaliza all walked the show, turning the presentation into quite a star-studded affair. The latest offering was classic Serre, including patchwork graphic pieces, cutout dresses, full patterned outfits, and that signature crescent moon motif. As usual, all garments were made from upcycled, deadstock materials, making the French designer still one of the most uncompromisingly sustainability-forward name in fashion. The collection spoke to the label’s essence of marrying couture elements with sportswear feels, underscored by that familiar wild, haphazard energy that garnered its cult following. Titled “Heart Beat” (with the actual rhythm joining the show’s soundtrack), this fashion show bumped with charisma.
Collage by Edward Kanarecki. Don’t forget to follow Design & Culture by Ed on Instagram! By the way, did you know that I’ve started a newsletter called Ed’s Dispatch? Click here to subscribe!
“Substance” seemed to be keyword for Jonathan Anderson‘s spring-summer 2024 menswear collection for Loewe. The three Lynda Benglis fountains that the designer’s curatorial enthusiasm had brought together for the first time were the first clues. One was tall and looming, another an apparently kinetically charged wave mid-break, and the last low and spreading like an unpruned shrub. Splashes of water erupting from Beglis’ structures inhabited the runway space, making the Loewe show an art experience, not just a parade of clothes. But the clothes were equally transfixing as the liquid-like installations. The garments hewn by Anderson and his team for this collection defined the shape and aspect of the moving human substance within them. By pulling the waistband of his pants up so very high, Anderson said afterwards, he wanted to create a way of seeing this collection that was akin to viewing it from ground level with a fish-eye lens. Coating some looks with crystals that glinted in the skylight sunshine invited you to see another watery parallel with Anderson’s installed artworks. When not obscured by long coats, or three hypersized swatches (complete with hypersized pins) of what looked like chintzy vintage wall upholstery fabric, that looming silhouette was generally undisturbed yet variously expressed. Sparkly polo shirts, chunky knits, argyle sweaters, trench coat shirts, and bonded gray rib knits with rounded shoulders or two dimensional side-tabs were all cropped around the southern reaches of the wearer’s ribcage. Three leather jumpsuits near the end, one pastel pink, latter scarlet, the last black, combined the trouser shape with the upholstery facade into a hybridized silhouette. “It’s always about trying to find contradictions in men and women: like how do you blur all of that? I feel like something in this is very precise in that message, it’s very reduced, very luxe”, Anderson said.
Collage by Edward Kanarecki. Don’t forget to follow Design & Culture by Ed on Instagram! By the way, did you know that I’ve started a newsletter called Ed’s Dispatch? Click here to subscribe!
When it comes to French style, nobody does it like Officine Générale‘s founder and designer, Pierre Mahéo. For spring-summer 2024, the designer “wanted it to be simple, but when it gets too simple, it’s boring, so you sort of need to trick it with styling.” He added: “I didn’t want undressed, I wanted downdressed.” Those sentiments underscored what the collection upheld: a languid fundamentality that wasn’t plain, but truly desirable. Mahéo made a strong case that purity in form can still come with a little flair and dazzle. The beautifully cast show opened with a black-and-white toned palette, and paired tailoring, foulards, and loose, almost pajama-esque shirting. Waistbands were elasticized; socks and garters were knee high – it clashed undone and done up nicely, but fell, impression-wise, on the simpler side of things, which was exactly Mahéo’s intention. The super chic designer also mentioned, in his show notes, that a “cold and rainy” winter in Paris led him to inject a bit of warmth into the mix. Enter ultraviolet and teal tones, tank tops and breezy shorts. Officine Générale is known for elevated essentials, yet this all felt truly summery – like Mahéo was exhaling, and finding a new stride of easygoing magic in the moment. Oui, oui, oui!
Collage by Edward Kanarecki. Don’t forget to follow Design & Culture by Ed on Instagram! By the way, did you know that I’ve started a newsletter called Ed’s Dispatch? Click here to subscribe!
Kim Jones‘ first collection for Dior seems like yesterday, but believe it or not, 5 years have passed since his big debut. I wasn’t always a fan of his work at the Parisian brand, but his recent collection – and especially spring-summer 2024 – make me change my mind. For this anniversary collection, Jones turned towards a canonical trio of Dior designers who preceded him. He referenced Yves Saint Laurent, Gianfranco Ferré, and Marc Bohan, enmeshing motifs from their times here with propositions of his own. The membrane the connected them all was Christian Dior’s cannage, the pattern the house founder based on the woven rattan chairs in which guests sat at his first salon show in 1947. The show opened with a coup de théâtre: the wide runway was composed of polished metal gray tiles. As the first Andrew Weatherall–conjured wheezing whalesong of Primal Scream’s “Higher Than the Sun” began to roll, the entire cast of models was raised from beneath the runway in a three-wide, 17-long grid of looks.
Jones’s design credentials are undisputed. He is also an extremely accomplished visual editor. He studded polished jewels on cardigans draped over the collection’s straight-legged, high-hemmed, high skirted tailoring, and then that over piqué polo shirts set with yet more jewels. Can we talk about the knitted beanies with velvet flower brooches?! Obsessed. Tweed loafers had buckles derived from a Lady Dior fragrance motif. Marled jacquard cannage knits in punchy colors were worn shoulder robed over more of the tailoring. Some jackets, semi-safarienne, were set with a bow at the breast pocket. Long tweed coats, high notch-collared and double breasted, featured the faded rattan shape within their muesli flecks and appeared to be bonded dresses worn from the shoulder. Dior’s Mitzah Bricard–inspired leopard print was reproduced on Saddle bags and vests. These were worn with sporty tweed shorts, which were later placed against tweed and piqué twinsets. The punches of fluoro green and orange added a psychedelic touch. As the designer put it himself: “It’s a collage of different designers in the archive expressed in shape, color, form and mood.”
Collage by Edward Kanarecki. Don’t forget to follow Design & Culture by Ed on Instagram! By the way, did you know that I’ve started a newsletter called Ed’s Dispatch? Click here to subscribe!
“We wanted to make it a study of elegance. To make it very masculine. So we asked what is masculinity now? And how we can make elegance also young, and interesting to the young?… I think streetwear is one thing, and it’s fantastic, but I also think people want more ways to dress to express who they are, and to enjoy,” said Dries Van Noten of his powerful spring-summer 2024 menswear offering. The herringbone wool in a gorgeous belted raglan shoulder coat contained zig-zags of camel and black, the two shades that set the tone for the opening phase of this collection. A stately orchestral start segued slowly then less so towards sweet repetitive beats by Soulwax. Gabardine pants fronted with trench coat skirts were foils against deep-V knits with matching wrapped skirts: modern twinsets. Slubby shantung silks, net linen knits, coated linen outerwear, knit velvets and muted optically enveloping prints provided textures both visual and tactile. The palette became dyed, sun-drenched, or even sun-burnt. To mix a bronze shirt and coat with gold sequin shorts (!), or play aubergine shorts against a mustard bomber was simultaneously unlikely and self-evidently effective. Some tops in mousseline were sheer, some sandals were strapped with fur, some hems on shorts and combat pants were frayed and raw, and the knit velvet sweater featured a grid of plucked perforations across the chest: layers of patina, wear, and form. This was a collection crying out to be moved into.
Collage by Edward Kanarecki. Don’t forget to follow Design & Culture by Ed on Instagram! By the way, did you know that I’ve started a newsletter called Ed’s Dispatch? Click here to subscribe!
Design & Culture by Ed 