Lemaire

Lemaire is a brand that emphasizes the understated, the slow, and the sensible. For autumn-winter 2023 fashion show, Christophe Lemaire and Sarah-Linh Tran shaped a charming, cinematic mise-en-scene featuring their friends and models wearing timeless layers. “We are always interested in showing our style in a situation that is not a conventional fashion show,” said Lemaire. “We are very much inspired by cinema, music, and people on the street – we are always trying to find a balance between reality and something elevated.” The first look, a female model in a typically swathing dark khaki coat, crossed in front of us – walking urgently – before disappearing into an elevator. Then, from both left and right, more models arrived, walking in couples, alone in contemplation, in chattering groups. One guy ran, halted, and ran again, as if in search of a pickpocket he’d only just realized had snatched his billfold. A woman all in gathered black – roomy pants, heeled boots, and a short trench with a large pouch-like bag tucked at her right hip – leaned against a pillar and waited. Soon enough a guy moved in to make conversation. The format effectively delivered the message that this was a collection that could function admirably in real-life. From the bird-whistle neck charms and the torch key chains, onto the Croissant bags and those body-hugging pouches, through to the pieces printed with instinctively psychedelic artwork by returning collaborator Noviadi Angkasapura, to the new-but-retro padded garments, there was a crowd of worn elements to watch and cherish. Especially enjoyable amid all the usual black and khaki were the meanders into richly dark green, unusual especially in menswear. As per, the fullness, the drape, and the silhouettes were exactingly crafted to transport you – just like the show format – to some imagined Paris between the 1960s and now where every citizen was the main character in their own impeccably costumed and multifaceted movie.

Collage by Edward Kanarecki.
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The Lemaire spring-summer 2023 presentation was a beautiful, harmonious scene. “It’s always nice to see people when they are in between things,” Christopher Lemaire said. “And people are very much themselves,” Sarah-Linh Tran added. Outside this presentation at the Musée des Arts et Métiers were clustered lots of fashion folk with no time to spare, waiting to go upstairs to see models in Lemaire acting as if they had time to kill. On the staircase a brace of male models idly swayed on their heels in top to toe monocolor stone, one wearing a crisp trench over full white pants in cotton and a split-upper slipper, the other a wide blouson over a collar-popped shirt and a multi-pleated silky pant with the same shoes. A female model in a culotte-integrating version of the outfits we’d just seen stood on the landing above. Up into the hall, there was a guy leaning on a window frame in brown blouson and work trousers with a bag strapped around his shoulder and a mini torch on his key fob. Across from him a woman in an interestingly halter-wrapped shirt and brown five pocket pants read a battered Luis Bunuel paperback. Further along another woman wore a dress and a guy wore a camp collar shirt that were both in the same hibiscus print. A female slept on a bench, warmed by the shafts of sunlight through the window, and cushioned by her softly blushing shirting and crisp cotton pants. A guy leant against a table in more pared down brown workwear reading Le Monde. At the end of the room, Ana Roxanne played mood music on multiple instruments and we saw more model groupings wearing super attractive printed pieces by the Indonesian artist Noviadi Angkasapura. This was a refreshingly straightforward collection that put the clothes on a pedestal of reality.