Hed Mayner keeps on delivering some of the most intriguing, form-defeating menswear in Paris. “There is this idea of attacking the proportion, from an angle that is more related to textile and from that textile creating the shape,” he explained. Collarless bomber jackets were puffed to perfection but crafted in lightweight linens for the summertime. Leather button-downs exaggerated the human form with striking, cocooning outlines, while buttoned vests revealed chiseled torsos beneath. Leather motorcycle vests were upgraded with tripled belts, followed by broad-shouldered pinstriped suiting and voluminous trench coats rolled at the cuffs to reveal checkered lining. Crinkled fabrics enclose the sense of pre-loved garments on multi-faceted outerwear, accompanied by the designer’s oversized version of Canadian tuxedos. You want to dance, jump, live in Mayner’s tactile and evocative garments.
Here are my beloved Hed Mayner pieces you can shop now.
There’s an appealing, sensually charged toughness about Magda Butrym’s collection for resort 2025. The Polish designer’s smokey-eyed and red-lipped glamazons are in a dreamworld, but one that isn’t a saccharine wonderland. A sense of enigmatic chic informs the entire line-up, blurring the lines between daywear and eveningwear, feminine and masculine, precious and utilitarian. The collection’s brave, tough chic mood finds inspiration in cinematic depictions of women in West Berlin during the late 1970s, from Luca Guadagnino’s “Suspiria” remake to Andrzej Żuławski’s “Possession“. The first, a perplexing story of a witchy dance school and its female-only cadre and students, informs the collection’s color palette. Rusty-tones, overcast-greens and earthy-ecrus meet intoxicating blood-red – the color of lipstick on the pale faces of Madame Blanc’s dancers, and their nail polish, and the unsettling interiors of the Tanz Akademie. In Possession, the high-pitched fever dream directed by the renowned Polish provocateur, Isabelle Adjani’s character Anna – entangled in an illicit, forbidden romance – storms metro stations and soc-realist neighborhoods in utilitarian, yet feminine dress-coats. These two so female-centered films deliver an unobvious outlook on women, their emotions, sensuality, and most importantly, their sacred power. The lookbook, photographed by Vitali Gelwich, was captured inside Warsaw’s iconic Dom Pod Orłami (“House Under Eagles”). This modernist pearl keeps in its thick, marble walls many untold secrets, from pre-war bank affairs to wild raves of the 1990s. Who knows what rituals happened down these long corridors and hidden staircases? The brute, monumental beauty of the building charges the lookbook with certain mysterious, elusive, even esoteric ambience, one that can be perceived in Guadagnino and Żuławski’s cinematic universes.
In all that highly feminine, yet commanding mood the designer is channeling and refining in her latest offerings, an assortment of no-nonsense, investment-worthy garments: a drab olive-brown jacket with a high, chin-grazing collar styled with matching pair of knitted panties;sensational outerwear in broad-shouldered cut; pleated, wool pants refined by the designer to perfection. But there’s also place for unabashed glam: the eternal style of Milanese sciuras unexpectedly dialogues with the unsung chic of Old Warsaw’s starlets like Zula through a retro-imbued overlap that comes evident in faux fur stoles wrapped around the shoulders, worn over seductive, ruched dresses with built-in corsets. Meanwhile, the two finale pieces of the collection are hooded black dresses in either above-the-knee or floor-sweeping length. They intrigue with minimalist sharpness of cut and the seductive depth of plunging necklines, subverting monastic connotations. As usual in case of Butrym’s style vocabulary, there’s a charming nod to her Slavic heritage. For resort, it comes in form of hand-made lace from Koniaków which is very proudly used in a crocheted body with sharp shoulder-pads, an apron-like skirt, shopper bags, and next season’s ultimate it-accessory: bonnets.
Psst… have you seen the designer’s first ever flagship store that she opened last month in Warsaw? Read about it right here!
Need a Magda Butrym wardrobe update? I’ve got you covered.
Mads Mikkelsen closed Zegna‘s spring-summer 2025 show, and also men’s Milan Fashion Week. Alessandro Sartori‘s take on the brand is always a pleasure to see, and a reminder that maybe there’s no need in reinventing the wheel. In the end, the best clothes are the ones that strike with quality and look always great, whatever trend is terrorizing the streets at the moment. Wearing Zegna, a man (or woman – Sartori confidently tips his toes in this field too!) doesn’t have to overthink his appearance, because these garments do all the work for him. The latest collection had a nuance of sensuality that was “quintessentially Italian, a certain idea of Italian elegance in the ’60s,” a feel for lightness and insouciance that seemed to break away from Sartori’s renowned, disciplined minimalism. The designer has translated traditional suiting into a luxe version of sportswear, and has given workwear an elaborate, rich new identity. His work is about hybridization of the highest refined order, with a constant tension in reducing the categories of masculine dressing and finding new solutions to liberate classics from the weight of their codes. He does it brilliantly, and with one of the best color palettes in the industry!
Collage by Edward Kanarecki. Don’t forget to follow Design & Culture by Ed on Instagram!
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Dunhill‘s renaissance under Simon Holloway is revelatory. The designer brings uncompromising refinement to male wardrobe, done the British way through a Milan filter. The elegance he offers is radical. Kink-ly, even. “This collection is really a sort of mirrored version of what we started with in autumn, so it’s this quintessentially English wardrobe,” he said. The designer explored Dunhill’s extensive archive, whose ready-to-wear origins lie in creating sports tailoring for when the car was invented and driving was still a luxury pursuit, and so the collection began with a deliciously expensive-looking spread of butterscotch suede car coats and chocolate brown leather jackets. Then came tropical wool tailoring the color of clouds – sharply cut but with breezy movement – charming tennis garb with leather racket cases, and finally a set of tuxedos so immaculate they kill with their look. Most models wore leather driving gloves – a menswear accessory at the verge of extinction, looking totally viable in Holloway’s vision, even for summer. Doing traditional, occasion-driven menswear without veering into archaic territory isn’t easy, but Holloway has a knack for striking that balance. This collection felt fresh and cohesive, and its rigor – aspirational.
Collage by Edward Kanarecki. Don’t forget to follow Design & Culture by Ed on Instagram!
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We’re entering Sabato De Sarno‘s third season at Gucci, but nothing has really changed since his debut. His menswear collections are slightly more persuasive than womenswear, but the spring-summer 2025 attempt largely feels like a Prada by Miuccia and Raf afterthought. The clothes are repeating: same over-sized coats, work-jackets and shirts return to the runway a couple of times, just in different colors and prints, as if De Sarno really believed they are reinventing the wheel. There are bits of kinky sprinkles that somehow add at least some flavor to the designer’s menswear – like leather briefs and fishnet tops – but that’s not enough to make a statement. The brand keeps on bringing up “emotions” in its communication, but I still feel nothing looking at De Sarno’s design. Believe me, I took myself to a Gucci store in search for all these “big feelings“, but these clothes don’t speak to me even IRL.
Collage by Edward Kanarecki. Don’t forget to follow Design & Culture by Ed on Instagram!
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Design & Culture by Ed 