JW Anderson – the iconography of childhood

Trips to music festivals this spring helped inspire JW Anderson's latest collection and what is sure to be the most acclaimed show of Milan's men's season.

A decidedly experimental collection in terms of cut, fabric, attitude, gender and humor from the Northern Irish designer. Who even included Ireland's most famous brand, Guinness, on the show. In black sweatshirts with pints of stout, where the cream-colored head was made of pearls.

After the show, Anderson revealed that he had been asking Guinness for years to use his logos and advertisements as they were part of his youth.

“I've always been a mega, mega fan of all Guinness advertising, even going back to the '20s and '30s. It's the iconography of my childhood,” explained Jonathan, who also played with the architecture of his youth.

A whole series of knitted and braided wool tops featured houses inspired by buildings in Britain and Ireland: a Georgian terrace house, a country house or a two-story house. While other series of down jackets had globular shapes, each sleeve was a large drop. Some ended up with ties a foot wide and three feet long.

“I like the idea of ​​clothes being primitive, which is what we do best. Hand-woven storytellers. And then creating a look where the depth of field is difficult to comprehend, where the proportion is off,” she revealed after the show.

Anderson added that he was worried that his signature menswear had become too casual and wanted to “blow it all up again.” Attending festivals made him realize that fashion had become very conservative. “I saw more people dressing in couture than what was really happening in fashion. That seems like a setback. A lot of people want something that's really challenging,” she argued, although she was wearing simple blue pants and a denim shirt.

See catwalk

Many guests showed up with their invitation, a T-shirt that said Real Sleep. Which JW explained by saying, “I liked the idea of ​​therapy, and did we actually get any sleep today?”

Organized in a converted hyperrectangular factory in the south of Milan, the collection, by contrast, contained more than twenty cocoon jackets and coats, although all cut diagonally below the knee. Made of quilted nylon, distressed leather, faded denim and with lots of high collars and gathered sleeves.

“We found that form last season and I hadn't had enough of it. It also does something with the body, which is really interesting. “It's like armor and protection,” said Anderson, who will leave this collection in a showroom in Milan for buyers, even before leaving for Paris to present his next show for Loewe on Saturday, June 6. 22.

A feeling of protection that extended to the buccaneer's pants, tied at the ankle, and his favorite footwear: thick combat boots, even if it was a spring summer collection.

“It is a very JW Anderson show, like the one from a decade ago, when we wanted to explore avant-garde ideas in fashion. You either take it or leave it,” he emphasizes.