FIRE 🌋 #DACBE: The #RickOwens #SS23 show gave armageddon vibes. Or at least that is what the massive fire orbs, lifted by crane high above the guests, and then dropped to a sizzling impact in the Palais de Tokyo fountain were there to represent. Ruminating during the line-out pre-show, Owens said: “the fireballs are flaming suns, arcing across the sky, and crashing to the ground. But I did it on repeat because it happens over and over.” He was referring to human fear of our extinction – whether through war, pestilence, or other generationally specific worst case scenario. “’I’m always trying to reassure myself that whatever is happening in the world right now – whatever conflict or crisis or discomfort – it’s happened before. And somehow goodness has always triumphed over evil, because otherwise we wouldn’t be here now.” Those words bring glimpse of hope especially in 2022, with war happening in Ukraine and Supreme Court’s outrageous overturning of Roe v. Wade. More on the JOURNAL ☄️ #Paris #ParisFashionWeek #PFW #WorldOnFire #Menswear #DACBECOLLECTIONS 🔥 #collage by me.
HARMONIOUS SUBLIMITY 🧡 #DACBE: #HedMayner‘s menswear collections are Paris Fashion Weeks’ moments of harmonious sublimity. In his notes, Mayner made it clear that he doesn’t do “overwrought statements of seasonal quirk.” Rather, season after season he revisits scaled-up proportions, honing them as a sculptor might. “I started by trying to build a silhouette that has a strong contact between front and back, and just being this two-dimensional look with a contrast,” the designer offered backstage of his #SS23 line-up. More on the JOURNAL ⏳ #PFW #Paris #ParisFashionWeek #Menswear #ManFashion #DACBECOLLECTIONS 🧺 #collage by me.
WHAT’S MODERN? 🧤 #DACBE: #JonathanAnderson is nailing it again, being in his cheeky, surreal element. For men’s #JWAnderson #SS23, the said he’d been moved by “the shock of theater” to shape a collection that tested our perceptions of clothing and modernity. The BMX handlebars, shattered skate decks and CDs were there to remind us of the ephemerality of modernity, and its inevitable descent into anachronism. The wearable assemblages were a witty commentary regarding overconsumption. “Fashion is a very modern device,” he said. “But it is not a modern act.” More on the JOURNAL 👖 #Milan #MilanFashionWeek #MFW #Denim #Resort2023 #DACBECOLLECTIONS 👔 #collage by me.
SURFBOARD 🏄🏼♂️ #DACBE: For #SS23, #DsQuared2 went surf-boy-mode. Dean and Dan Caten’s layering extravaganza inspired by surf culture and 1970s Jamaica is just what a stinking-hot summer wardrobe needs and wants. The Catens worked with the Bob Marley Foundation, which granted them permission to reproduce a portrait of the reggae genius on T-shirts, beach totes, and bags. “We liked the vibe of that time, and the freedom and rebellion he represented,” they said backstage. “Peace and love, and the joy of music.” More on the JOURNAL 🌺 #MilanFashion #Milan #MFW #SurfBoard #SurfBoy #SurfLife #VanessaReid #DACBECOLLECTIONS 🐚 #collage by me.
ARRIVAL ✨ #DACBE: For her brilliant #SS23 collection, #GraceWalesBonner mentioned “Sankofa”. This bird-looking-backwards symbol of Ghana’s Akan people, she said: “means’ ‘going back to go forward.’ It is not about being nostalgic or historical. It’s about taking something from the past in order to pass it forward and make it useful for the future. And that’s the spirit of this collection.” #WalesBonner was speaking in the central courtyard of #Florence’s #PalazzoMediciRiccardi, the key space of #PittiUomo event. The Palazzo had been waiting 485 years – the time since it was once home to the first Black head of state in modern Europe – to become the outbound runway for Grace’s Sankofa flightpath. Its starting cipher was #AlessandroDeMedici, who until his assassination in 1537 at the hand of a cousin ruled here as the first hereditary monarch of the Florentine Republic. His mother was named #SimonettaDaCollevecchio – aka “Soenara” – and was Black. She became mother to Alessandro after an encounter with either Duke Lorenzo (the official father) or Pope Clement VII. “I wanted to acknowledge that presence but also think about the idea of arrival,” said Wales Bonner. More on the JOURNAL ❤️🔥 #Menswar #ManFashion #KerryJamesMarshall #LiyaKebede #DACBECOLLECTIONS ❣️ #collage by me.
IT’S HOT, HOT 👄 #DACBE: “I never gave up on being dressed, even when the trend was about sportswear,” says #SaintLaurent’s #AnthonyVaccarello of his #PreFall2022 collection, the until-now-unseen curtain raiser to his sublime and epic winter show, presented earlier this year. “I am glad that people want to dress up again, because for me nothing has changed.” More on the JOURNAL 💄 #SoChic #ItsHot #FauxFur #YSL #Sublime #DACBECOLLECTIONS 💋 #collage by me, music: “Heroin” by #LanaDelRey.
IMBUED WITH MEANING 🌞 #DACBE: At the #NewYork-based brand #Bode, #EmilyAdamsBodeAujla’s collections have always been rooted in the persona. The lived histories of friends, family members, and even places all hold keys that unlock the fantastical trove of embroideries, embellishments, prints, and colors that have established Bode as one of the most exciting new American labels on the scene. For #PreFall2022, now hitting the stores, however, Adams Bode Aujla turned inward, looking for inspiration to her own wedding to her longtime partner and collaborator #AaronAujla, which took place in their newly purchased home upstate and brought together Punjabi traditions from his upbringing as well as ones from her mixed Southern/East Coast heritage. More on the JOURNAL 🌼 #Marigold #Tailoring #ClothesThatTellStories #Menswear #ManFashion #DACBECOLLECTIONS 💛 #collage by me.
LOVE YOURSELF 🪐 #DACBE: She’s THE #Mugler goddess-babe-bombshell-queen. For #SS22, #CaseyCadwallader reunited with #TorsoSolutions for the final installment of a trilogy of Mugler fashion films. Filmed in Los Angeles, the mind-bending video features a variety of vignettes that blend trippy glitches with the signature Mugler fierceness. Another day, another slay, period. More on the JOURNAL 🔥 #LourdesLeon #MeganTheeStallion #BellaHadid #HaleyWollens #ChloeSevigny #Goddess #DACBECOLLECTIONS 🌪 #collage by me (2/3), music: “Plan B” by Megan Thee Stallion.
TABULA RASA ☁️ #DACBE: To create a responsible brand in the 2020s entails more than choosing sustainable materials and cutting down on manufacturing and shipping costs. As #Gabriela Hearst, the creative director of #Chloé sees it, building awareness into the marketing plan is part of the process. “The problems fashion has are the problems that all industries have,” she said. “The world’s energy supply is 85% from fossil fuels, and if we don’t eliminate that situation we’re really walking into suicide. All these alternate energy sources – wind power, solar panels – don’t have the capacity.” Fusion, Hearst explained, could make up the difference as we wean ourselves off of oil. “In a nutshell,” she said, “fusion is how stars are made. It’s the energy that moves the universe.” For #Resort2023, the fusion lesson consisted of broderie anglaise and laser cut leather in the form of stars and a night sky palette of strictly black and white, save for a single red dress with a scoop neck and full poet sleeves. She credited Joel Cohen’s recent adaptation of “The Tragedy of Macbeth” for the corset shape of dresses accented with knotted leatherwork evocative of medieval chainmail, and leather jackets and vests patchwork paneled like armor. More on the JOURNAL 🌬 #Chloe #Pleats #SustainableFashion #DerekJarman #DACBECOLLECTIONS 🌪 #collage by me, music: “Restraint” by Florence + The Machine.
Design & Culture by Ed 