Fashion. Marc Jacobs SS25

February 4, 2025 | Design & Culture by Ed

Oh, Marc. Thank you for reminding us all about the absolute joy of fashion.

With his pre-NYFW, less is more-production show, the designer sparks bold, unashamed happiness. Bubbly silhouettes. Cropped proportions. Big sequins. Bigger than life ball-dresses and teenie-tiny cardigans. Lego colors. This is fashion that doesn’t take itself seriously – but is far from being non-sense. Inspired with legendary women, from Rei Kawakubo to Queen of Hearts, this is Marc Jacobs’ ode to courage, beauty and uncompromising hope in better tomorrow.

“With precious freedom we dream and imagine without limitation… not to escape from reality but to help navigate, understand, and confront it, exploring through curiosity, conviction, compassion, and love.”

Thank you.

Collage by Edward Kanarecki.
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Goth & Fit. Rick Owens AW25

February 4, 2025 | Design & Culture by Ed

This season’s Rick Owens man is both goth and fit. He will show off his muscular torso while wearing a crop-top with padded, Nosferatu-sih shoulders. Tyron Dylan, Rick’s muse, looked like the yassified version of Count Orlock. The elongated, supernatural look was omnipresent in the autumn-winter 2025 collection. This time, the designer was interested in the idea of essentials. Cropped shearling sweaters and coats in black were cut up to the base of the rib cage, while double-face wool caftans in cream were cut down to the knee. Skimpy wide-leg shorts were (sometimes) made secure with thermal long johns of a type Owens only became an evangelical fan of after moving from California to Europe. “It’s about, How can I get rid of stuff and make the stuff that I really need as special as possible?’ And that is a good exercise when thinking about making clothes in the world the way it is today.” It was also a good exercise in showing clothes that, once acquired, you’d wish never to be parted from.

ED’s SELECTION:

Rick Owens Satin Wide-leg Cargo Pants

Rick Owens Drain T Paneled Cotton-jersey And Crepe De Chine Top

Rick Owens x Moncler Appliquéd Wool And Cashmere-blend Balaclava

Rick Owens Cropped Bleached Brushed-cotton Bomber Jacket

Rick Owens x Converse Drkshdw Dbl Drkstar Canvas High-top Sneakers

Collage by Edward Kanarecki.
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French Men. Fursac AW25

February 2, 2025 | Design & Culture by Ed

Nobody understands French guys’ style like Gauthier Borsarello. Since his appointment in 2021, the designer – and avid vintage collector, just check his ReSee selection! – has worked relentlessly to redefine Fursac’s position in contemporary menswear. This season he presented the brand’s first runway collection: an utterly chic mix of great tailoring with seductive nonchalance (dialed up with unexpected details like yellow leather gloves or crotchet ties), so natural to Parisian men. Executed with the styling help of Imruh Asha, the collection plays with the style images of renowned Frenchmen: think Jacques Dutronc, Alain Delon, and the boys of Nouvelle vague.

Collage by Edward Kanarecki.
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Gesture. Hed Mayner AW25

February 1, 2025 | Design & Culture by Ed

“The gesture allows the clothes to exist,” said Hed Mayner backstage at his autumn-winter 2025 fashion show a week ago. How true this sentence is. You can have the most finely made garment in the universe, but if it just hangs in the closet, does it even matter? Clothes need a person’s gesture to be alive. But some clothes work harder, and once they are given life, they in return transform the wearer’s body language.

Of all contemporary menswear designers, Mayner balances utility with beauty of clothes in the most supreme way. And his new season perfecto jackets, leather pants and fringed shawls not only make you want to wear them, but also gesticulate in them – a lot. The fit of his over-sized wool-felt coat is so graphic and bold it creates a real silhouette. Same can be said of the sharp, yet round-edged plaid tailoring and meaty-velvet culottes. I can totally confirm what I’m saying, as I had the utmost pleasure of trying some of these garments in the label’s showroom. They truly transform your stature, give confidence, but at the same time seamlessly convey this “don’t bother me” attitude, just like Yohji Yamamoto’s designs.

ED’s SELECTION:

Hed Mayner Oversized Hooded Bomber Jacket

Hed Mayner Oversized Terry Sweatpants

Hed Mayner Inverted-Lapel Oversized Sport Coat

Hed Mayner Large Inverted Pleat Pants

Collage by Edward Kanarecki.
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Intensity of Living Today. Lemaire Aw25

February 1, 2025 | Design & Culture by Ed

In Paris, once you had to stand in a long line to enter a Christian Louboutin or Chanel boutique. Today, those stores are relatively empty, and the (even longer) lines are now shaping in front of Lemaire and Buly 1803 stores. That’s really telling about the contemporary customers. And honestly – they’ve got taste.

Lemaire, the product of Christophe Lemaire and Sarah-Linh Tran‘s highly-coherent creative dialogue, is a brand that although makes big numbers, still feels like a safe, intimate space for people who feel their best in soft minimalist sensibility. For the autumn-winter 2025 co-ed show, the duo delivered what they do best: chic layering, no-nonsense outerwear, witty accessories, and body-skimming silhouettes inspired by Pina Bausch and Merce Cunningham’s post-rehearsal outfits. Tran said that the clothes sum up “the intensity of living nowadays.” Strokes of Almodovar-esque scarlet red made the offering feel exciting and livid. The Lemaire designers know what they’re doing.