Fashion has become so much more than the fit, fabric and finish. It goes beyond the color and texture trends. Fashion is a reflection of social, economic, political and cultural changes. It is the brand that speaks, that tells the story, pushes boundaries and calls for change. And this season designers did just that and more. Maybe Men’s Fashion Week isn’t men’s anymore? The line between masculine and feminine blurred on the runway.
From bitcoin to apocalyptic tones, here are the top five unusual themes and top five trends of New York Fashion Week: Men’s Autumn/Winter 2018:
1. Cryptocurrency
The cryptocurrency craze has taken to the runway, too. Brother designers’ Ariel and Shimon Ovadia of the Ovadia & Sons label, button-up shirt announced “Bitcoin, No Cash.”
Abasi-Rosborough, described their new color-red infused collection as,”Facial recognition. Cryptocurrency. Genetic modification. Autonomous cars. Anthropo- cene extinctions. Anti-intellectualism. Social media addiction. Corpocracy. Synthetic food. Celebrities as leaders. State surveillance. Global isolationism. The advances of our time are profound, but the direction in which they are moving society is a matter of perspective. Utopia or dystopia?”
And even though Raf Simons’ all-night rave inspired collection drew more commentary on drugs than cryptocurrency, the Financial Times described the show as “the inner sanctum of a boiler room, where brokers pitch their clients on penny stocks and digital currencies with a Machiavellian zeal.”
Simons showed slim cut three-button suits, oversized topcoats paired with surgical gloves and rubber boots, and turtlenecks with slits, some of which had patches with three letter acronyms like XTC and GHB. “One was just a letter off,” from a Bitcoin code, the FT joked.
2. Nonbinary Clothing
Indie label Krammer & Stoudt, created by a married couple Mike Rubin and Courtenay Nearburg, opened Men’s Fashion Week without having cast a single male model. This season’s collection was inspired by the 1971 play “Cowboy Mouth,” written and performed by Sam Shepard and Patti Smith. And more importantly inspired by the thrill Nearburg felt when she discovered Terra Juano, a model known on Instagram as TJ (@Renegades_). TJ identifies as nonbinary, like many of the models cast for the show–Madison Paige (@madspaige), Arta Gjonbalaj (@artagee), Rain Dove (@raindovemodel) and Merika Palmiste (@merikatheone).
LUAR is the reversed namesake label of Williamsburg-based, 29-year-old designer Raul Lopez, who is of Dominican descent. The new collection, titled “Pieces of Me” was breathtaking in every way—from music to the runway looks. Before the models walked out, the song “Pieces of You” by Jewel played, with shocking lyrics, such as, “She’s an ugly girl, does it make you want to kill her? She’s an ugly girl, do you want to kick in her face?”
Lopez has no strict rules when designing and keeps it unique, neutral in color and gender fluid. The designer has spent his youth listening to house music and hanging out in the ballroom scene, a creative safe space for LGBTQ people of color. The clothes were stamped with Feminine Destruction, the name of a transgender ballroom dancer. Lopez said the collection reflected on the past, destroying notions of femininity in order to move forward towards a future of progressive clarity.
One of the guests of the show was Gia Garison, a transgender model, recently dubbed as one of the “supermodels of the next generation” by Refinery29. Spotted after LUAR’s show, Garison said the show was “amazing” and the “music was crazy.”
3. Sex, Drugs & Rock ‘n’ Roll
Barbara Sanchez-Kane is a Mexican designer known for her political messages. This season, her sexually charged show was inspired by her interpretation of sexual oppression in Mexico.
Barbara Sanchez-Kane fashion show during Men’s Fashion Week (Irene Sekulic)She took on sexual topics of all kinds, from the lack of adequate sex education to same-sex love. Two dancers in orange chaps and jockstraps danced around giant penis statues, as models accessorized with all sorts of sex-related objects, such as condoms in a model’s hair, walked by. The plaid suiting was inspired by Catholic school uniforms.
To close New York Fashion Week: Men’s, Raf Simons threw a rave, inspired by his fascination by underground club culture at nightclubs such as Berlin’s world-famous Berghain. In his version of the rave, there was also food for the guests before the show started: there was wine, plates of charcuterie, chocolate, waffles, fruit and bread and cheese. But the show was more of a cautionary tale about the clubs’ drug culture rather than the admiration of it. Simons found inspiration in the non-fiction book-turned-film Christiane F. – Wir Kinder vom Bahnhof Zoo, in which the young character falls into the 1970s West Berlin’s club scene, leading her to drug addiction.
4. Workwear
Who knew that we should draw fashion inspiration from construction workers? Designer Daisuke Obana of N. Hoolywood even tapped some real New York construction workers to model for him. There were overalls in safety orange, wide-leg cargo pants and denim trucker jackets with oversized patch pockets. A surprise was the unveiling of the label’s collaboration with Timberland Pro. The construction workers wore their hard hats with stickers from various construction sites around the city and ended the show on a high note.
5. Apocalypse
Given the current political climate, there was also a lot of sadness and shock-factor on the runway. Willy Chavarria, who is Chicano, for the new collection “Believers,” cast black and Latino models who looked like they had just cried and had faux-tears applied on their tattooed cheeks. The clothing continued the designer’s exploration of Chicano and Cholo culture: mostly black and grey colors, silhouettes of work shirts and cargo pants, with the oversized overcoats creating a swagger/tough guy look. To mark the end of the show, a bare chest man carried a newborn baby (yes, a real baby, not a doll) down the runway.
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