Prada’s latest collection left me feeling a bit unnerved. It wasn’t that Miuccia Prada and Raf Simons’s offering was “bad” – honestly, can they ever get it wrong? – but the collection’s near-fixation on extreme skinniness felt genuinely discomforting. I’m an XL; I’m never, ever fitting into those cropped denim jackets or hyper-slim trousers. But this isn’t about me – it’s about the message the collection sends. If you don’t possess the frame of an adolescent, forget about being invited to this party.
While I can perhaps forgive the romanticization – and even the fetishization – of youth in, say, Hedi Slimane’s work, I hold Prada to a higher standard. Prada is so much more than that. Where is the nuance? READ MY FULL REVIEW HERE.
Collage by Edward Kanarecki. Don’t forget to follow Design & Culture by Ed on Instagram.
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Anthony Vaccarello’s Saint Laurent menswear collection seemed to have it all: a perfectly orchestrated front row amid a Paris heatwave, a new kinky shoe with an elongated toe and transparent construction, and a Fujiko Nakaya water-vapor installation as the show’s backdrop. Yet the clothes themselves felt inflated – not with substance, but with artifice.
It increasingly feels as though Vaccarello is repeating the same tropes: exaggerated shoulders on virtually everything, nylon-like windbreakers paired with tailored trousers, and trench coats rendered stuffy for no discernible reason. The flashes of eroticism are there, certainly, but they can’t speak for themselves; they get choked – though not in a sexy way – by relentless overediting.
I remember reading a few years ago that Vaccarello fantasized about doing an all-gold collection but couldn’t find a way to make it look chic. Well, he still hasn’t. The three final looks in slightly antiqued gold fabric failed to make much of an impact. Perhaps too much gold is inevitably tacky after all.
Collage by Edward Kanarecki. Don’t forget to follow Design & Culture by Ed on Instagram.
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JW Anderson opens the spring-summer 2027 season with a cast brimming with character and charisma – while keeping the clothes firmly in familiar territory. More than a year ago, Jonathan Anderson very deliberately repositioned his London-based namesake label, a move that made perfect sense once his biggest job shifted to Paris at Dior. Gone are the runway spectacles; in their place come carefully crafted lookbooks starring friends of the brand, dressed in the signatures you can find year-round in JW Anderson’s meticulously curated boutiques. Craft – unmistakably British craft – remains the central pillar. At this rate, the label could soon become the new Barbour or even Burberry, albeit with a sharper sense of humor and considerably cooler company. In other words: the next great British brand. Donegal wool knits bloom with wildflowers and ferns, while the house’s signature knitwear references the image of a traditional Irish cottage. The ever-present squirrel motif traces its origins to a Scottish Fair Isle pattern from Sanquhar, and a striking red coat with a matching scarf emerges from a collaboration with Johnstons of Elgin (arguably the source of the finest cashmere in the world – sorry, Italians!). Throughout the collection, Anderson playfully weaves together folk textiles, domestic objects, and rural craftsmanship, recontextualising them through a joyful cast that includes Dree Hemingway, Isaac Cole Powell, Camille B. Waddington, Sophie Okonedo, and more than a touch of flamboyant mischief.
