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Press, partnerships, feedbacks – or if you just want to say hi! – contact me at designandculturebyed@gmail.com

POWERFUL BEAUTY ❤️‍🔥 #DACBE: Second collections are always the most difficult to pull off, especially when done for a legendary maison like #Alaïa, where the heaviness of legacy might simply overwhelm the most talented designer. Great news: #PieterMulier nailed it. For #AW22, “we translated the DNA of Alaïa with a little bit more of what I like. It’s basically about beauty. It’s the next step after the last collection: a push forward. I didn’t want a concept. Just beautiful girls and beautiful clothes.” More on the JOURNAL 🖤 #ParisFashionWeek #PFW #Paris #AzzedineAlaia #HauteCouture #Couture #LeatherDress #DACBECOLLECTIONS 💥 #collage by me featuring #RobertMapplethorpe’s series with #LisaLyon, music: “Nothing’s Special” by Oneothrix Point Never and Rosalia.

HIGH SCHOOL BOYS 🏉 #DACBE: Ending this menswear season with one of the emerging Parisian brands, #AlledMartinez, which after last season‘s success continues to celebrate and embrace queerness. After telling a story of love and tragedy between two men, #ArchieAlledMartinez takes a less melancholic approach for #AW22. The designer translated the high school codes of the early aughts into his garments. There are tiny tees, and tinier, tighter trousers, and perhaps most symbolically laden for those actually in high school in the aughts, jeans shrugged down so low that boxer shorts peek out from the waistband. Bruce Weber’s Abercrombie hunks come to mind, but Alled-Martinez has a more approachable look - think of this like a Hollister fever dream. More on the JOURNAL ⚽️ #ParisFashionWeek #Paris #PFW #HighSchoolBoys #Menswear #DACBECOLLECTIONS 🥏 #collage by me.

VIVACIOUS 🌹 #DACBE: Although #PacoRabanne‘s #AW22 isn’t officially couture, it was a suitable start of the Parisian week of haute fashion. #JulienDossena continues to expand his vocabulary for the brand, temporarily leaving behind Rabanne’s heritage chain-mail and digging into personal obsessions. “The abstract volumes came from the couture register,” Dossena said, referring to the sculptural form language associated with classic haute couture. “But super short, a bit extreme, with really cinched waists, and mixing it with knitwear to make it more, let’s say, contemporary.” On paper, that procedure sounded pretty #1980s, and many of the looks could have been hyper-takes on the decade’s vivacious silhouette. Think #NanKempner’s style whenever she arrived to Paris. More on the JOURNAL 🔥 #ParisFashionWeek #PFW #Paris #80sFashion #DACBECOLLECTIONS 🎥 #collage by me.

NIGO KNOWS 🌹 #DACBE: #Kenzo might be finally be back on the right track with a new creative director. For his sharp debut, #Nigo (the legend behind A Bathing Ape) invited the fashion crowd and some big names – Pharrell Williams, Shygirl, Tyler, The Cretor, and of course the couple of the moment, Kanye West and Julia Fox – to #GalerieVivienne in Paris. In the place where #KenzoTakada presented his first fashion collection in 1970, the brand’s 2022 renaissance crystallised. Beautiful kimono jackets were mixed with vintage-y knits and Ivy League varsity jackets. The bibbed gingham aprons worn over suiting were contemporary adaptations of a specific Japanese garment worn during the tea ceremony. This intriguing cross-section of cultures is exactly what Takada used to in his collections, always with grace and consideration. More on the JOURNAL 🌺 #Paris #ParisFashionWeek #PFW #Menswear #DACBECOLLECTIONS 💐 #collage by me.

NEW SURREALISM 🐬 #DACBE: #JonathanAnderson’s #AW22 collection for #Loewe was an exercise in the surreal, but a post-digital era take on the genre, which he said was more “psychotic” in an existential way. “Who are we? Where are we going? Is it real, is it not real? Are we in that moment? Do we believe what we say?” In a world where we’re more fascinated with creating a metaverse than improving the real one, those were good questions. More on the JOURNAL 🦋 #ParisFashionWeek #PFW #Paris #Surrealism #Menswear #DACBECOLLECTIONS 💙 #collage by me, music: “Voyage Interieur” by Michael Mayer and Miss Kittin.

SENSUAL MASCULINITY 🤍 #DACBE: At #JilSander, a certain sensibility was carried by crochet wrapped around necks and heads and spliced with oversized blazers and tuxedo jackets that couldn’t have made for a bigger contrast. “We liked this really elegant, masculine silhouette, but with a sensual side to it, as well,” #LucieMeier said after the show. “We start a lot with tailoring, just to see what we really want to do and say and what we care about. But this time, we worked it into typically feminine techniques as well,” #LukeMeier added. More on the JOURNAL ☁️ #Paris #PFW #ParisFashionWeek #SoftMinimalism #Tailoring #DACBECOLLECTIONS 🖤 #collage by me.

Thierry Mugler 💔 Farewell to the king of eternally chic hyper-sexuality and camp elegance. His vision of women shaped such a big part of contemporary pop culture. There are no designers like him today. R.I.P. 🕊 #ThierryMugler #Mugler

STRANGE BEAUTY ☁️ #DACBE: This season, #DriesVanNoten spent the season thinking about how the restrictive, COVID-related conditions are affecting his team. “A lot of young people don’t go out anymore, they don’t see a lot of people. Touching each other, making love to each other… it’s changed. I think it’s a collection where you really feel what state we’re in, and what we’re longing for. That is the desire we wanted to explain: the frustration,” he mused. Shot by Casper Sejersen, Van Noten’s #AW22 film featured a bunch of models getting tactile in a big mansion in Paris. There were close-ups of three real-life couples kissing: two men, two women, and a man and a woman, who all embodied the designer’s genderless objective. More on the JOURNAL 🤍 #PFW #Paris #ParisFashionWeek #HenryKitcher #Tailoring #Genderless #DACBECOLLECTIONS 🕊 #collage by me, film stills from #DerekJarman’s “Garden”, music: “Watercolour Eyes” by Lana Del Rey.

EXTRATERRESTRIAL 🛸 #DACBE: If Prada started the topic of statement outerwear for men this season, then #GmbH joins the conversation with a major tailoring moment. #SerhatIsik and #BenjaminHuseby are perfecting the cuts of coats and blazers to a couture-level dimension. Take away the wonderful and brand-identifying regal strapping and fur and we are left with a soft 1.5 breasted jacket with a high lapel that fell loosely and beautifully down the body. When worn against the thigh-highs, these jackets’ skirting generated kink, but worn against pants they were differently but no less potently seductive. Let’s not forget about the extraterrestrial elements of the offering, like the disturbing alien shoulders and this sort of out-of-this-world drama conveyed by the garments (very “The Fifth Element“!). More on the JOURNAL ❤️‍🔥 #Paris #PFW #ParisFashionWeek #Tailoring #OutOfThisWorld #Menswear #DACBECOLLECTIONS 👽 #collage by me.

SUBLIME GARDENER 🌷 #DACBE: I really loved #KimJones‘ #AW22 menswear collection for #Dior. It might come as a surprise that Jones, who has devoted most of his Dior collections to collaborations (which sometimes feels to predictable) with artists and writers, approached his 75th anniversary homage to the house as a one-man show. It was refreshing to see a Dior collection that was purely Jones, somewhat similar to his debut from a couple of years ago. An offering like this may not receive the hype of last season’s Travis Scott collaboration (which didn’t end well…), but in its Dior-core it will serve to enlighten new audiences in what the house historically represents. More on the JOURNAL 💐 #DiorMen #Paris #ParisFashionWeek #PFW #Tailoring #Gardening #ChristianDior #Menswear #DACBECOLLECTIONS 🌼 #collage by me.

STROBE 🚧 #DACBE: “I just went to Egypt, and they have those shapes, those beautiful shapes, and I thought if I did that as a Dan Flavin helmet, that would be so cool.” This is how #RickOwens summed up his out-of-this-world, ethereal #AW22 menswear collection. By combining the headwear profiles of Ancient Egypt with some adroitly applied Philips light bulbs, Owens created headpieces that doubled as lamps – “they’re all free-standing.” The on-and-off-again lighting meant that much of the detail was suppressed from the eye: what was left were elongated, hyper-masculine silhouettes with an alien twist. More on the JOURNAL 👽 #Paris #PFW #ParisFashionWeek #AlienAbduction #AncientEgypt #MinimalArt #DACBECOLLECTIONS 💡 #collage by me.

VIRGIL’S DREAMHOUSE ☁️ #DACBE: During his eight collection residency, #VirgilAbloh, who passed away in November 2021, turned the house of #LouisVuitton upside down and inside out. He made the exclusive inclusive. The #AW22 collection apparently marked the final segment of that arc, and in the set at least it appeared to come full circle. More on the JOURNAL 🌟 #ParisFashionWeek #PFW #Paris #AngelsInTheSky #DreamHouse #Menswear #ManFashion #DACBECOLLECTIONS 🕊 #collage by me, music: “Kiss of Life” by Sade.

BODY 💜 #DACBE: Next week during the haute couture presentations, #GlennMartens will moonlight as a one-season only creative director for #JeanPaulGaultier. At this #AW22 ready-to-wear show, Martens presented first hints of the dialogue: “We took one of his most iconic prints and we interpreted it in a #YProject way. It’s very layered – you have men’s prints and women’s prints and they go on top of each other.” The trompe l’oeil body prints and penis pants that Martens was referring to, and which will be part of Y/Project’s Gaultier-facing ready-to-wear capsule, were certainly striking and worked well with the Belgian designer’s signature garment distortion. More on the JOURNAL 🌹 #Paris #ParisFashionWeek #PFW #BodyLove #PreFall2022 #DACBECOLLECTIONS 🐚 #collage by me.

TRAVEL SOMEWHERE 🌞 #DACBE: I have such a sweet spot for #Lemaire. I’ve said it plenty of times, and I will say it again: this is the brand that utterly satisfies me in the context of my personal, day-to-day style. #ChristopheLemaire and #SarahLinhTran just never disappoint me. For #AW22, the designers-slash-life-partners turned to the idea of “traveling somewhere” – something we all fantasize about in our harsh, pandemic reality. “Dressing up is a little bit like traveling,” Christophe mused. “You get dressed up, you go to someone, or you have a destination in mind.” More on the JOURNAL 🌝 #Paris #ParisFashionWeek #PFW #SoftMinimalism #MarkRothko #DACBECOLLECTIONS 🪴 #collage by me, music: “These Days” by Nico.

PARISIAN CROWD 🖤 #DACBE: This was one, big, star-studded #Ami collection. “We have done two digital shows and now we’re back. It’s a kind of resistance,” said #AlexandreMattiussi backstage at his #AW22 fashion show. The designer had the Métro on his mind: “It’s the only place today in a city where everybody is on top of each other. There’s an old lady, a guy coming out from a party, a guy who is on the way to work, kids, grandmothers, different vibes, different cultures. This is the only place where you don’t have the choice of who you will be seated with,” he observed. “It’s a democratic thing. And Ami is about dressing everyone.” In the label’s world, #IsabelleAdjani and Laetitia Casta commute too, and wear timeless clothes that draw heavily on the French wardrobe tropes. More on the JOURNAL 🚇 #Paris #PFW #ParisFashionWeek #BenAttal #ParisianChic #Brassai #DACBECOLLECTIONS 🎞 #collage by me.

POETIC OUTERWEAR 🤍 #DACBE: #HedMayner’s #AW22 collection exists in the space “between despair and ultimate hope“. The Israeli designer explained further: “But I am thinking about the space between you and the garment, layered and protected…you are in a bubble.” Mayner speaks like a poet and he designs like one too, operating instinctively and emotionally, more interested with how a garment will feel on the skin, move about the body, and imprint on a life than how cool it looks or how hype-y it is. More on the JOURNAL 🕊 #Paris #PFW #ParisFashionWeek #OuterWear #PufferJacket #Menswear #MansFashion #DACBECOLLECTIONS 🧡 #collage by me.

REFINEMENT 🕶 #DACBE: #UmitBenan, one of the best #Milan-based menswear (and not only) designers, focuses on uncompromisingly manufactured and painstakingly designed ultra-luxe clothing. For the #AW22 offering, modelled by the always-chic #GiovanniDarioLaudicina, some of the finest pieces included a workwear-inspired essentials (mostly in double cashmere) and investment tailoring. “At the end of day, I don’t want to mess too much with design. The emphasis is on great stuff, stuff that’s so great you want to come back and buy it again”. More on the JOURNAL 🌹 #MFW #MilanFashionWeek #Menswear #ManFashion #Tailoring #TimelessClassics #DACBECOLLECTIONS ☕️ #collage by me.

EMBRACE THE WEIRDNESS 🗝 #DACBE: For #AW22, #JonathanAnderson embraces all things “weird”, and aesthetically navigates between the 1980s (sparkly party dresses) and the now trending, early 2010s “indie sleaze” (metallic lycra jumpsuits). #JWAnderson is all about the “weird”. When Anderson detects weirdness, he is not repelled but stimulated: for him “odd” and “bad taste” hold creative opportunity. More on the JOURNAL 🍭 #Milan #MFW #MilanFashionWeek #WeirdCore #IndieSleaze #DACBECOLLECTIONS 🕷 #collage by me, music: “Which Way” by FKA Twigs and Dystopia.

COSMIC DANDY 🪐 #DACBE: For #AW22, #Prada “ate” (that’s how TikTok kids communicate that something is absolutely brilliant). There are two reasons why this collection, which opens the fourth season of #MiucciaPrada and #RafSimons‘ ever-exciting creative dialogue, is truly mind-blowing.

WILD ‘N PREPPY 🌲 #DACBE: #KeanEtro‘s #AW22 collection is to die for! The #Etro offering for men delivered rushes of wildness and preppy, a combination that isn’t that easy to pull off. Royal velvets meet knitted sweaters with tearings; shearling jackets with folklorish embroideries styled with slightly scruffy, vintage-y denim pants; wolf motif layered over the brand’s signature paisley pattern. This is certainly a wardrobe for lovers of eclectic dandy-ness with a hedonistic twist. More on the JOURNAL 🐺 #Milan #MFW #MilanFashionWeek #LeonDame #WildThings #Knitwear #Menswear #ManFashion #DACBECOLLECTIONS 🪲 #collage by me.

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