Big flappy greatcoats, baggy trousers and
voodoo charms… that is what fashionable men will be wearing next autumn
and
winter if the Paris catwalks are anything to go by.
As men’s fashion week wound up Sunday in the French capital, some clear
trends were emerging for the months ahead, not least that black is back
with a
vengeance.
From Dior to Givenchy and Yamamoto and Rynshu, it was everywhere in velvet,
leather and wool, often combined with red check, the style touch of the
season.
But the trend that dwarves all others is for big and baggy. Small families
could settle down for the night inside many of the overcoats that have come
flapping down the runways this week.
Raf Simons went hyper-supersized with enormous puffa jackets, Off-White’s
coats were so long they were almost adult sleep suits and Rick Owens went
and
created an actual sleeping bag coat, all riffing on the idea that the modern
male needed comforting and somewhere to hide.
Watch out too for overlong sleeves that reach almost to the fingernails
and
rich, silky purples that appeared most memorably in Dries Van Noten’s
gorgeous
macks and peacock and serpent pattern coats.
Pink — which in the 19th century was seen as the most masculine of
colours
before it was lost to bubblegum girliness — has made a tentative comeback
too.
It adorned the collars of Givenchy’s coolest jackets, Julien David used
it
for his most cuddly coats, and it was everywhere in Pigalle’s panorama of
pastels.
Hermes tried to take a little of the taboo away by making theirs almost
raspberry, while Officine Generale hid their pinks behind blacks and greys.
Another longtime style no-no, the lumberjack jacket, may also be about to
be brought in from the cold, meekly making an entrance in Valentino and
getting a glamorous makeover by Dior.
But for sheer aplomb, it was hard to beat the dramatic return of braid
and
breeches.
Balmain’s tyro Olivier Rousteing galloped back in time to round up some
of
the most swashbuckling looks of the 18th and 19th centuries.
Don’t be surprised if you soon see pop stars — of whom the young
designer
has an adoring fan club — dressing up like hussars that could have stepped
from the pages of “War and Peace” or “The Red and the Black”, the colours
that
dominated his collection.
Agnes B went for less of a testosteroned look, dressing three of her
models
like 18th-century bourgeois gentlemen in blue and purple velvet, complete
with
tricorn hats.
But extra large and extra baggy dominated. Even the oldest of the Paris
houses still showing, Lanvin, wrapped itself in flappy greatcoats Sunday in
the first collection under the sole control of Lucas Ossendrijver after the
shock departure of artistic director Alber Elbaz in October.
Rather than make a flashy splash, Ossendrijver — who had been at the
label
for a decade — went for detail under the watchful eye of the brand’s
Taiwanese owner Shaw-Law Wang.
Elbaz sportingly posted a supportive Instagram message saying, “Good luck
with your show today Lucas.”
And Ossendrijver did succeed in making the show in a huge hangar on the
outskirts of Paris strangely intimate, bringing buyers and press right up
close to his creations on the narrow catwalk.
“I wanted people almost to touch the clothes and then be touched by
them,”
he told AFP.
“There is a softness and a sensuality about the collection,” he said of
his
loose cut suits and highly-worked coats and shirts that flirted with grunge.
British designer Paul Smith was having none of the new giganticism,
however, sticking by his tried and trusted tailored line.
His Sunday show revisited some his classic designs with strong echoes of
the 1960s with Crombie coats, single vertical Mod-inspired stripes and
Saturday night suits with subtle flower details.
His show began to the chimes of Big Ben and the reggae track “My England
Story” before embarking on a musical history of Britain over the last 50
years that ended with the late David Bowie’s “Oh You Pretty Things”.
The clothes, however, drew their inspirations largely from the 1960s and
1970s, with combinations of rich clarets, greens, purples and mothball
blues.
“I love the playfulness of this collection,” he told AFP. “We are on a
bit
of a high at the moment.”
Paris’s haute couture week started late Sunday with Versace although the
shows only begin in earnest Monday with Christian Dior and Schiaparelli.
Haute couture exists only in Paris and is sustained by a small number of
the world’s richest women. (Fiachra Gibbons, AFP)
Photos: AFP