Yes, the weather outside is frightful but we’re already looking ahead to the crisp, warm autumnal days of September 2024 as Chanel and Balenciaga drop their pre-fall 2024 collections. Will we be wearing Chanel bourgeois x Manny pride, or a seedy remix of the LA It Girl? Read more of our thoughts on both collections below. Elsewhere in the sartorial world, LỰU ĐẠN drops their very 90s SS24 campaign, Eckhaus Latta have turned their gaze to eyewear and Aro Archive comes back to London. We also have a new Palace x C.P. Company link up, a new On sneaker, a le FLEUR* lookbook directed by an iconic hip hop artist and that Bottega Veneta campaign. Here’s what’s in fashion.
Chanel takes to Manchester for the 2023 Métiers d’Art show
There’s a lot to be said about Manchester’s contributions to culture and capital-F fashion alike. Whether it’s the music of ‘Madchester’, the wild antics of the Hulme Crescents, or the eternally relevant designs of Peter Saville – himself enlisted to create one-off graphics for Chanel’s occasion – the city remains an unequivocal epicentre of raw talent. Add to this a long history as one of the major players in garment production thanks to its old mill industry, and you have the perfect city for Chanel’s latest Métiers d’Art (pre-fall 2024) offering. The latter initiative, of course, was born yonks back to showcase localised spaces of craft and artisanal design, maintaining the maison’s history of couture, but also elevating different hubs of creativity across the globe – from Senegal to Manny. And so, on an aptly wet and chilly Mancunian evening along the roads of Thomas Street, just north of the Shoreditch-parallel that is the Northern Quarter, Chanel unveiled a very crafty and ebullient offering, soundtracked by Michel Gaubert with plenty of native sounds, spanning The Fall to New Order’s Bizarre Love Triangle, which closed the show.
Where clothes were concerned, creative director Virginie Viard struck a fine balance between homage to her hosting town and protection of her own label’s strict codes. As such, nods to the terraces of Old Trafford came via the odd zesty football scarf, plastered in rave-style graphics, while woven sets or bouclé skirts spliced jacquards with the legendary black and yellow or black and green hazard lines your kooky aunt will remember from her days as a Fac 51 member. Whether this was an official collab with The Haçienda starchitect Ben Kelly remains to be seen, but the fact remains, such iconography holds an emotional – if not slightly triggering – place in the minds of fashion’s older guard.
Broadly, the silhouette took a cooler, 60s Chanel bend, doubling down on the early post-war tweeds we know and love, but rendering them in heartier, warmer tones of scarlet and Vimto purple (very Manc!), reading like a nod to the old matriarchs of Manchester’s working-class strongholds that dressed up everyday despite the bitter cold and less-than-ideal working conditions for themselves and their labouring husbands. Indeed, anyone that’s ever pored through Shirley Baker’s 60s photography of Salford and Manchester’s terraced streets, will recognise the slightly removed but grin-and-bear-it elegance the models channelled in their walks along the concrete roads yesterday evening. In fact, you can sense this very spirit in Manchester today, where girls mix high and low – just as Chanel did fine cashmere with costume jewellery – peppering big branded double-Cs with a big tweed coat, quilted pink bag in hand and still little in the way of trousers. They’re ‘arder than the southern softies of London, remember. Still, who’d have thought it? Bourgeois Gaulois meets a ‘reet good night out’. Nice one, our Virginie. JB
LỰU ĐẠN drop their tattooed boys filled SS24 campaign
In the just under two years that Hung La – of Kwaidan Editions fame with his partner – formed his solo venture LỰU ĐẠN, the brand has established its aesthetic of unearthing the complexity of Asian masculinity through a cinematic lens. Think: staples of the rough and ready garms of 90s streetwear paired with a soft femininity. Think of his SS24 collection filled with board shorts, denim gilets and overly branded low hung trackies paired with lacy embroidered shirts and intricate graphics. For the campaign for the collection, Hung enlisted tattoo and barber collectives Viet Monster and Liem Barber to wear little more than the Tobi trousers, traditionally worn by Japanese construction workers, of the collection and to turn the lens on each other. The result is a series of photos set within the streets of Ho Chi Minh City that look like they could be stills of the loveable bad boys from Baz Luhrmann’s Romeo + Juliet and we’d happily be the innocent angel-winged girlie they start a street war over. TG
Eckhaus Latta turns its eye to sunglasses
If you’ve been after those sunglasses that Eckhaus Latta debuted on their SS24 runway, well, we have good news for you – they’re finally here! Designers Mike Eckhaus and Zoe Latta have reinterpreted classic aviator and cat eye shapes, in a manner that feels in line with the brand’s sensibilities. For one, ‘The Speed’, a retro, wire framed pilot shape available with black or green lens and ‘The Tilt’, an amped up cat eye style with wavy frames, aren’t classically gendered and reflect the collections sleek silhouettes. “It was our intention to not make statement sunglasses; rather, design styles that speak to familiar silhouettes and materials,” Mike said of the brand’s venture into eyewear. Like the covetable, Eckhaus Latta footwear range, eyewear will be a new ongoing category for the brand. Check out the otherworldly, Michael Hauptman-lensed campaign and get your hands on a pair, here. ND
Tyler, the Creator directed a video lookbook for le FLEUR*
To celebrate the second ever apparel collection from his brand GOLF le FLEUR*, everyone’s favourite rapper, Tyler, the Creator, just dropped a star-studded, self-directed video lookbook. In the hazy visuals, Lil Yachty, Maverick Carter, Anwar Carrots and Tyler, himself, all don the label’s plaid sports coats, plush, patterned puffers and matching fur ushanka hats, as well as logo berets, hoodies, workwear trousers and a new lime green varsity jacket emblazoned with the text ‘le FLEUR* SUN SEEKERS’. Shot in the California sunshine, the video sees Tyler and his very well-dressed friends talking themselves out of some kind of drama, offering explanations to a police officer who’s taking notes out of frame. Playing out alongside detailed shots of the brand’s cartoonish graphics, all we can seem to focus on are the fire looks. The collection releases in stores on December 9th and online on December 13th. ND
Aro brings its fashion, art & furniture archive to London
After the closure of their Broadway Market store earlier this year, Aro Archive are back in London! The family run business of curated pre-owned pieces from Japanese, Belgian, French and British design spanning from the late 19th century to present day, have fittingly taken over an old Victorian fabric warehouse in Shoreditch. What’s more across the five floors is rooms presented in homely set ups, filled with clothing, books, art and furniture all available to buy. That’s right, everything! The brand will of course still have their 12,000 piece collection that will be kept for research and viewing purposes in exhibitions and by appointment. “This new store means everything to me. It means we survived the pandemic and separately one of the most personally challenging times in my life. It means we have new avenues to explore as a team. It means a boots on the ground community safe space, which I’ve missed so much” founder Ariana Waiata Sheehan said in a statement. “I really wanted it to feel like a chaotic version of a family home, which many of us don’t have and so many more do, but maybe don’t realise and everything in-between. It’s a home full of love, colour, community, chaos and life!” Go claim your room in your new home on 1 – 3 French Place, East London. TG
Pamela Rosenkranz & On drop a new sneaker at Art Basel
There were many art works, galleries and exhibitions to check out at Art Basel Miami Beach this week (see some of our favourites here) but one that was not to be missed was the installations and drops from On. The Swiss label known for their performance clothes and running shoes partnered with Art Basel and artist Pamela Rosenkranz on a new version of their popular footwear staple, the Cloudnova Form. Taking inspiration from her monumental 25-foot art piece Old Tree, the pink and red branches of the sculpture are painted and digitised into a print across the limited edition trainers. Put them on and then go on one of On’s walks around Miami Beach that sees them take viewers around the city’s famed art scene before heading over to a special On speakeasy for all those sunny Floridian vibes.
Balenciaga pre-fall 2024 was so LA
SoCal gals are shaking. Yes, after Demna went full Orange County on us, ushering in yoga-mom lycras and yet another so-bad-it’s-fab running sneaker, the verdict is out: being basic is back, so long as you do it with a wink, a nod and a freshly brewed flask of ‘juice’. What goes into that superfood fruit shot is totally your call, but where clothes are concerned, Balenciaga gave pretty clear pointers. Lycra, lycra, lycra! Well, that but in the typically goth-ified iteration that makes Demna a master in making something otherwise wholesome – speed walking, spin class and comfort – feel just a little cursed. Granted, those uber-Y2K velour tracksuits read as pretty approachable. That is, until you noticed the monster Ugg lookalikes worn below. One one hand, it was giving teen American It Girl à la a young Miss Hilton; on the other, it was uncanny valley via Rodeo Drive. Shown alongside the vacuum-formed visor shades and talon nails, the collection offered a taste of Demna’s early aesthetic honed in the late teenies, elevated still with a cooler, refined palette and less of an onus of screaming graphics. As for the overlayed t-shirt-cum-vest tops and inside-out City bag, such jibes felt almost like an homage to his halcyon days at Vetements. For whatever reason Demna had picked out LA to showcase his latest collection, it made an effective setting to throw his techno-laden aesthetics into stark relief against sanitised Californ-isms. Sure, you might have the Hollywood sign floating in the distance, palm trees lining your catwalk, but Demna’s Balenciaga always brings doom, however fresh your coffee is. It was as if to say, “You might buy health foods at Erewhon, but we know what you get up to on Saturday nights – and that’s fine.” Naturally, we’re here for it. JB
Alexandra Carl’s Rizzoli book explores the wardrobes of archive fashion obsessives
Wouldn’t it be a dream to peruse Michèle Lamy’s mammoth Comme des Garçon archive, or all of sneakerhead Sarah Andelman’s and footwear connoisseur Zaha Hadid’s collections over the years, or Endyma’s selection of vintage Helmut Lang? Well, you don’t need to make like the Bling Ring and check if they’ve left a front door key under the welcome mat; a new book from Alexandra Carl and Rizzoli delves into the collections of archive obsessives across 300 glorious pages. Collecting Fashion: Nostalgia, Passion, Obsession not only delves into the most important archives across the world, it also offers insights and tips from fashion and art collector insiders on how to start your own collection. Available to pre-order now, add a copy to your basket and maybe in a few years time you too will have one of the most desirable closets in the world. TG
Palace reimagines C.P. Company’s most iconic garms
When winter rears its ugly head, you can trust the boys at Palace to usher in a serious outerwear collaboration. And boy, do they keep ‘em coming. Hot on the heels of one steazy Barbour rework, the skate label offers up its sophomore crossover with CP Company, the Italian streetwear OG founded by Massimo Osti – the genius also behind Stone Island. Unlike last year’s anglo-Italia crossover, this new offering eases up on the intentionally imperfect, overdyed designs, and instead presents something a little cleaner. Peacocking bloke-corers keen to flex their sartorial nous on the football terraces or outside the pub will be all over those deliciously named Kan-D jackets, whose transparent sweetie wrapper appearance and goggled hood is techwear completed. And yes, dear hypebeasts, people will indeed know that your fresh threads are Palace, even if they don’t pick up on the offbeat nods. Among iridescent lenses, toggles aplenty and hunter pockets placed on the lower back, the words ‘Palace Company’ are emblazoned across the collection. As for the classic, swamp-green placket-collar knitwear and trapper hat design, these are go-to stocking fillers for any splashy gorper headed to greener pastures this holiday period. Plus, the safety-orange, fastenable number, also topped with the wacky racer goggles, looks sure to sell out stat by the autofill-checkout kings, so get cracking. Oh, and if you really feel the bite this time of year, then the lofty, down-fill jacket is everything, zipping all the way over the face, ideal for cosplaying as a football casual, too. The collab drops 8 December at Palace and CP Company. Run, don’t walk. JB
A$AP Rocky and Kendall Jenner’s paparazzi pics become a Bottega Veneta campaign
Love them or hate them, the paparazzi remain an integral part of pop culture, charting the juiciest and most trivially mundane moments from the lives of our favourite stars. Of course, their prevalence doesn’t change the fact that what they’re doing is indeed a little odd. Popping out for milk? Papped. Picking up your dog’s mess? Papped. Yep, it’s perhaps the grossest indictment of 21st-century life, when surveillance capitalism reigns supreme and celebrities are often in on their very own sightings. Still, it’s kind of fun, right? At least, Matthieu Blazy thinks so. For his latest Bottega Veneta Resort 2024 campaign, the Parisian designer licensed some of the best pap shots of Lord Flacko and Kendall Jenner, tapping into our carnal desire to see how they get down day to day. Plus, dripped out in the finest fashions from Bottega – some of which are, you guessed it, deceivingly made in leather – they make for quite the guessing game. Was A$AP’s marl tracksuit made from cotton or…? Was he en route to see RiRi when he got caught mid jog? Oh, and surely KK knew she was getting snapped when she slipped into that plush, mint-green, fluffy coat. No one slays like that without at least knowing there’s a chance of Getty passing by. That said, there’s an undeniably earnest and quotidian feel to the shots, making it clear that even though they’re stars, they too have to do groceries, walk the dog – a doberman, in KK’s case – or pick up a berry smoothie à la Rocky. And quite right, too. These are clothes that on first glance look like your daily staples, be that a flannel, a pair of baggy jeans, a set of heels or even a classic tie. But look closer, and you’ll soon discover all is not as it seems. Plus, for flashier folk, the harlequin calf boots and two-piece will be favourites come pre-spring when the fashion cognoscenti need something to pep themselves for winter’s last push. JB
The Fashion Awards celebrated the best of British talent on the world stage
The London fashion scene is well known for its exciting young designers to know and iconic music artists storming the world stage, but less so as a place Hollywood a-listers bother dropping by unless they have a movie to promote. The star-filled audience of The Fashion Awards 2023, taking place in The Royal Albert Hall, proved otherwise though, as the likes of Anne Hathaway, Pamela Anderson and Gwyneth Paltrow were all sat to celebrate the vanguard of fashion today. And who were those lucky winners? Taking home the Designer of the Year award was of course Jonathan Anderson who has also recently been proclaimed for turning Loewe into the hottest brand du jour. Everyone wants those froggy shoes and pigeon clutches! The British Menswear and Womenswear awards went to industry-shifting designers Martine Rose and Maximilian Davis for Ferragamo respectively, while the New Establishment Awards went to rising star Bianca Saunders for Menswear and cult followed Chopova Lowena for Womenswear. Paloma Elsesser took home the Model of the Year Award, the first plus size model to do so, while the Cultural Innovator award went to Sam Smith for the way they’ve sparked conversations within and around fashion through their unapologetic self-expression. They followed up their win with a performance of their recent big hits while wearing a stunning Vivienne Westwood look. Finally, there were many special recognition awards of the night that honoured those such as Charlotte Tilbury, Sarah Burton, Michaela Coel, Campbell Addy, Joe Casely-Hayford, previous i-D editor turned British Vogue editor in chief Edward Enninful, and Valentino Garavanni, who was celebrated with a final breath-taking runway of some of his best signature red creations. TG