Beforehand this was billed as a combined menswear and womenswear show. And yet on the JW Anderson catwalk this season there was not a single man. Was Jonathan, a designer who has, for pretty much all of his career, discarded the distinctions between gendered dressing, making another, more subtle comment? It felt more specific than that – although there were definitely pieces on display that many men would wear — it was a collection about femininity.
There was a definite summery mood in much of what was shown too, it was full of lightness and fluidity. Between his JW Anderson and Loewe brands, Jonathan shows six mainline collections a year and you might forgive the designer for being spread a little thin. Especially with all the extra-curricular activities he’s been engaging in; craft prizes and art exhibitions with Loewe, and a project for JW Anderson that sought out young photographers to shoot his campaign. A catalogue for that competition stood in for a press release this year. A big book of work highlighting the power and diversity of young creativity feels an apt takeaway from a collection overflowing with ideas. Instead of a press release pushing us in specific thematic directions, it felt more open, more purely about clothing, more interestingly about creativity.
