Men’s – The Beauty of Resistance. Rick Owens AW24

January 19, 2024 | Design & Culture by Ed

When Rick Owens speaks, you better listen. The designer’s autumn-winter 2024 fashion show, entitled “Porterville“, wasn’t only a visually mind-blowing experience and wholesome food for thought, but an act of resistance.

The starting point of this brilliant collection was the tedious circumstance of transiting through airport retail. “We are herded through that gauntlet of a very specific beauty and aspiration: of a certain kind of sexuality, a certain kind of face shape, a certain kind of body shape – and it’s unattainable.” For Owens, this experience sums up contemporary mass luxury and what he observes as an intolerance of difference that is the result of its function to sell a dream of sameness – a homogenized standard. “I call that standard ‘airport beauty.’ And I oppose it. And when I wear my platform boots as I go through the airport it is to oppose airport beauty. This is my resistance.” Subverting enforced conformity – that’s actual beauty.

For this very personal show, Owens opened his house in Paris, instead presenting the collection at the Palais De Tokyo courtyard. “That standard is dishonest… but this is a fully resolved Rick Owens experience. It can’t get any more honest or authentic than this. And that was my basic urge this season: to be sincere.” He added: “I’m trying to participate in and contribute to all alternative beauties: to bombastic beauty, sometimes, but also kind and soft beauty.” And what is “Porterville” about? The show’s name is after the California town in which Owens was raised. “Bleak,” is how he describes it. “I remember it for its intolerance – although the intolerance I experienced was mild, obviously, compared to any intolerance that we’re seeing today.” By contrast this house – which Michele Lamy secured when she and Owens moved to Paris just over two decades ago – is a sanctuary. “I want to be a haven. A force of anti-intolerance.” The clothes reflected all that. The designer honored creative collectivism by inviting multiple collaborators to share his platform. The fantastically insectoid inflatable rubber boots that puckered and popped as the models walked in them were by London based designer Straytukay. Owens said he saw another Londoner, Leo Prothman, posting his take on Rick’s signature Kiss boots and asked him to add them to today’s collection. Challenging to manufacture but fantastic to watch were the jackets and pants made by rubber couturier Matisse Di Maggio. The family of Owens models were this time joined by the Russian trans artist (and exile) Gena Marvin.

The collection was also a retrospective look at some of Owens’ all-time classics, now magnified, even more elongated and subverted. The almost ecclesiastically spiked shoulders of his duvet jackets, the airbag embrace of his balled body wrappings, and the beastly toughness of his fluffed jumpsuits and capes both projected and protected character. The leather perfecto, in hands of Rick, is an entire cathedral architecture.

This is a fashion moment that reminds you, during the endless fashion month cycle, that it’s all worth it.

Collage by Edward Kanarecki.
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Men’s – Cowboys. Louis Vuitton AW24

January 17, 2024 | Design & Culture by Ed

Two seasons might be two early to call, but as they say, first impression is the right one. Pharrell Williams’ direction at Louis Vuitton feels like watching a very self-satisfied kid play around with new, shiny toys. Or rather, as in case of the LVMH machine, huge resources. For his first fashion show for the brand, the musician decided to turn Paris into his sandpit. Why not make Pont Neuf (and eventually paralyze Parisian traffic for a day) a runway venue? Then, for his sophomore season, Pharrell picks a new theme: now he wants to play with cowboys! There’s no need for a further review of the autumn-winter 2024 outing at this point. The clothes – or rather overstyled outfits, some better, some worse – speak straightforwardly for themselves. Cowboys. Horses. So Ken.

I might have never been a number one fan of Virgil Abloh’s work for Louis Vuitton, but he had concepts and ideas, sometimes very risky and envelope-pushing ones, flipping this brand upside down. Pharrell is orchestrating (or at least is a face of it) a big, big marketing ploy, with no much consistency, coherence or sense. Will it turn out that well in the long run? Time will tell. I might never understand it. And I’m fine with that.

Collage by Edward Kanarecki.
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Men’s – In Search Of A Spark. Gucci AW24

January 13, 2024 | Design & Culture by Ed

Sabato De Sarno‘s vision for Gucci is taking shape of a formula. His debut womenswear collection was a product-centric, straightforward parade of unoffensive clothes; the ad campaigns operate on blank backgrounds and offer no visual risks; and his first menswear collection for the brand is also moving in that generic, business-is-business direction. Except for one kinky, taken-out-of-the-Tom-Ford-book look where the model wore nothing but a pair of tailored pants, a tie-leash and a pair of leather gloves, this Gucci outing left you with no bold impression. Maybe because most of the looks were the same as in De Sarno’s September debut – like the opening over-sized coat, or the navy v-neck knit with embellished collar, or the color palette consisting of pops of cherry red? It’s actually quite surprising the designer has such confidence in these couple of looks that he’s already mirroring them. It’s probably to early to call, but De Sarno’s Gucci feels like mash-up of your favorite Italian brands: a bit Prada there, bit of Valentino here (where the designer worked before his Gucci appointment). The only signifiers that make it Gucci are the monogram logo, placed on belts and backpacks, and bag re-issues. Don’t get me wrong: those are really good clothes, there’s nothing wrong about all these timeless pea-coats and loafers. But I don’t think De Sarno is giving us enough reasons to be invested in his new Gucci. The designer gives big statements on “artisanship“, “Italianity“, “beauty“, even “good taste“. But as he says himself, “I don’t have a narrative for my collections at the moment”. That shows.

Collage by Edward Kanarecki.
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Men’s – Incense In The Air. John Alexander Skelton AW24

January 12, 2024January 17, 2024 | Design & Culture by Ed

In London, (the unofficial) Men’s Fashion Week couldn’t begin in a more astounding, ecclesiastically-euphoric way. At St. Bartholomew the Great, London’s oldest parish church, with air heavy with incense, John Alexander Skelton had his triumphant return to the runway. For autumn-winter 2024, the designer -took inspiration from the gothic aesthetic and intangible emotions that This Mortal Coil, an ’80s dream pop collective, elicited. “It’s my emotional response to the music“, he said. That took shape in romantic longline coats, tailored suiting, knitwear and shirting, with Skelton’s signature horn buttons dotted throughout, and sported by stately models clutching lit candles in hand. Regal, but chic; mystical, but not whimsy.

Inky blacks composed the majority of this season’s palette, a choice Skelton attributed to examining 15th-century portraiture in which wearing black was “generally thought of as a power symbol,” he explained. It was contrasted with a drop of blood-red ruby, which took the form of meaty velvets. While John Alexander Skelton is often inclined to spin a rich and theatrical yarn around his collections, the essence of his appeal lies in the clothes themselves – just hold one of his shirts or tailored trousers in your hands, and the extraordinary craftsmanship and timeless textiles look and feel just as arresting as any of his runway spectacles.

Collage by Edward Kanarecki.
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Artist At Home. S.S. Daley SS24

July 11, 2023 | Design & Culture by Ed

The theme of artist at home has sprung dozens of stories where a visionary creates a vividly alive environment that becomes not only their studio, but a “total artwork” (Germans have a term for it: Gesamtkunstwerk). History of art – especially the British one – has plenty of examples of such romances between creatives and their surroundings. Horace Walpole’s Strawberry Hill. Sir John Soane’s home-turned-museum. Vanessa Bell and Duncan Grant’s Charleston, which became a bucolic residency spot for the Bloomsbury Group. For his spring-summer 2024 collection, Steven Stokey-Daley centres around the duality of ceremony and practice, following the life and home of an artist. Harry Styles’ favourite designer began his research by studying the lives of British painters Lucien Freud and David Hockney in their working environments, taking a look back at British public school dress while examining the shifts in sexual identity in the early 1900s. All that sounds distinctly S.S. Daley. The new season offering is a neat continuation of Steven’s style vocabulary: clean-cut suiting is paired with pleated shorts, blooming hydrangea embroideries decorate striped workwear sets, oversized wool knits are canvases for charming dachshund puppies (Hockney’s favorite breed, as well as mine!) and ducks. Some of the shirts come in still life fruit bowl print, which reminisces the ever-evolving European artistic tradition. Multi-pocketed, waterproof coats are nonchalantly splashed with paint (you just always splatter your favorite clothes while painting!), echoing the collection’s idea of merging the domestic intimacy with the sacred act of creating and expressing your own, untamed, highly-personal thing.

And here’s a bunch of my favourite S.S. Daley items you can shop right now:

S.S.Daley Navy ‘Bunny Boy’ Long Sleeve T-Shirt

S.S.Daley Off-White Tabard Vest

S.S.Daley Off-White Striped Shirt

S.S.Daley Red Tabard Vest

S.S.Daley Beige Large Tote

Collage by Edward Kanarecki.
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