Over at Louis Vuitton this menswear season designer Kim Jones took his latest collection for the house on yet another voyage that spanned the length of Oriental chinoiserie and the breadth of Americano sportswear.
To achieve this feat, Jones worked on fusing stiff preppy stylings with silky and sinuous ensembles that produced a tension between the exotic and the everyday that one couldn’t one’s their eyes off. Working primarily with statement blocks of bright primary hues and clear-cut monochrome tones, Jones succeeding in qualifying each piece with the Vuitton seal of approval, with not one single thread out of place and each size in perfect correlation with the strapping male form.
Quirks came in the form of some firsts for the house of Vuitton, specifically, the almost – gasp – Ed Hardy-esque “Louis Vuitton” inscription motif, which curiously brought to mind London’s new crop of sportswear mavericks. This sense of adventure worked well in SS16 favour however and Jones did well at balancing out the collection to cater for Vuitton’s loyal customers and a more international crowd of nouveau riche-rs.
But to each their own, nonetheless this was a collection of stunning menswear pieces that collectively can’t be faulted. If Jones’ penchant for fantasising about whereabouts in the world the grass might be greener is anything to go by, Vuitton is not going to be showing signs of slowing down anytime soon.
by Liam Feltham