When presenting a collection, it’s pretty much customary for a designer to deliver a story alongside it, however loose or literal it might be. But for his untitled spring/summer 19 show, Alex Mullins came armed with nothing but a sentence to explain it: “This season Mullins showcases 27 looks, in a series of 9 triptychs.”
That’s it. No throughline offered, no inspiration revealed, no nothing. But if you were ready to put him on blast for being lazy, or for his unwillingness to form a fashion fantasy, you only had to look at the runway to be proven wrong. What could’ve been messy and incoherent — this is nine sets of three looks, after all, and few of them bare any resemblance to each other — revelled in its reluctance to be easily defined. It was fashion for fashion’s sake, and in an era of unnecessary backstories, few of which actually manifest well on the runway, it was surprisingly stimulating.
If anything is a constant in Mullins’ clothes, it’s his infatuation with twisting and smearing reality, finding a fine line between the familiar and the slightly fucked up. Last season, he toyed with tie-dye and cut-away shapes to create irregular, audacious tailoring: shirts that exposed his models’ nipples and torsos, and puffered suit jackets. The season before that, he played with the dichotomy between his dainty daisy prints and horrifying, Leatherface-like silk masks.
Those who find pleasure in Mullins’ challenging MO are bound to be intrigued by his latest collection, too. On the runway, he presented an array of rack-ready garments, each one carrying their own added layer of ‘extra’ — often just for the fun of it.
A trio of double-breasted suits, his opening looks, were bound beneath dayglo, raver vests. The luridly coloured layers were cut as if the models had tried (and failed) to get them properly over their heads at the last minute; worn backwards, or like their heads had gone through the arm holes. One of the more commercial pieces, an Alex Mullins logo sweatshirt (complete with a zig-zag red underline, as if it was spelled incorrectly) was paired with Battenberg cake-chequered trousers. But it was the ostentatious leather cross-body bag that became that look’s centerpiece.
The traditionally-patterned tailoring was, as expected, always elevated by an element of obscurity. Another double-breasted summer suit was presented in a swirling, banana-custard colourway, while others, like those in the closing look, were complete with an apron-like layer of fabric that tied behind the neck, and paid homage to Japanese culture with a sort of deliciously tacky koi carp print.
His trinity of tiger-print shirts were among his more safe pieces here (a new take on the bold Hawaiian print trend we’re seeing this season), but they too were paired with boy scout, knee-skimming shorts with exaggerated high waistlines, something Mullins’ has played with in the past.
After revelling in the freedom of luxury fashion for a few seasons, Alex Mullins’ latest collection showed a designer with one hand on the industry rulebook and another firmly on his own. He’s found a middle ground, sure, but he’s done it in his own singular and playful way.
Credits
Photography Mitchell Sams