ultra sexy in JW Anderson, sporty-chic in Giorgio Armani, Dhruv Kapoor

Milan Men's Fashion Week ended in style on Monday, showcasing original looks and high-quality collections. At Giorgio Armani, JW Anderson and Dhruv Kapoor, designers showed that even the new trend of quiet luxury can be joyfully subverted. Jonathan Anderson had fun changing the codes of men's fashion, showing bare-legged male models wearing sheer stockings, while Giorgio Armani and Indian designer Dhruv Kapoor cleverly combined a sportswear register with a formal one.

A giant eye peering through a spyglass at one end of the catwalk stared at the audience and the collection, as if Armani himself were scrutinizing them. The light blue iris shone in the darkness, like a moon reflecting on the shiny floor of the court. It was a way to keep some distance from this chaotic world while he observed it. The seasons pass, so do the trends, but the elegant and natural style of the Italian couturier remains.

Armani picked up the thread for Fall/Winter 2024-25, infusing his fashion with a new, even more carefree attitude, adopting lightweight constructions and looser volumes, as well as expanding the color palette, introducing countless shades of beige, blue and gray. . Everything had a more fluid, cozy feel: the often collarless jackets, the baggy pants tucked into booties or gathered at the ankles like joggers. The shirts were off. Instead, the collection was filled with knitwear, silk T-shirts, polos and even turtlenecks in vibrant turquoise and pink colors.

The suits and coats were made of the finest wool fabrics and in a thousand and one variations, from checks to speckled designs, herringbones and more. Different elements can be combined at will. A light gray Prince of Wales check jacket paired beautifully with a sailor-striped jumper. A herringbone jacket looked great over a black velvet ensemble, a striped hoodie, and even a two-tone sweater. Armani reinterpreted corduroy suits with a contemporary feel and even dared to include furry leopard print tops.

“We worked a lot on proportions, to give the garments fluidity and softness, much more than in my first creations. The volumes change according to the user's movements, giving the silhouette an extremely natural poise. Men's fashion does not need to be subverted. We must do the usual in an unusual way,” said the designer at the end of the show.

The collection exuded casualness and comfort, and in the end revealed a very sporty side, introducing several garments from the Neve (snow) winter sports line. The latter included roomy down jackets, ski suits and pants made of nylon and performance fabrics with moiré print details, mittens, snow boots and brown furry jackets apparently made of aged leather. As well as a helmet, a small handbag that hung on a rope around the neck, and large waterproof woolen bags.

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Dhruv Kapoor also drew a lot of inspiration from sportswear influences, but with a more couture feel. The Indian designer has been showing in Milan since June 2022, like the Irish designer Jonathan Anderson. Over three seasons, Kapoor has managed to make his voice heard, reliably placing his brand on the last day of fashion week, between two big Italian names like Giorgio Armani and Zegna.

Born in New Delhi, Kapoor founded his label in 2013, after moving to Milan, where he studied at the Istituto Marangoni and worked for Etro. He started out designing extremely colorful and exuberant urban clothing, and has now managed to take a turn towards a more sophisticated and higher quality style, firmly leaving the influences of Indian folklore behind. His new collection featured some eye-catching items richly decorated with embroidery and sequins, particularly the luxurious jackets, but he devoted much more space to understated, tailored looks.

The sporting record was also evident in many small details. Shirts that extended into short pleated skirts, a reference to tennis. Sports jackets with oversized American football style shoulders. Colorful t-shirts that look like football shirts, as well as garments that combine neoprene and traditional fabrics. Kapoor loves to run and also launched a collaboration with Nike, which sent him a selection of t-shirts and tops from his idle stock, with which he created four special looks that will not be available for sale.

To celebrate its 10th anniversary, Dhruv Kapoor has redesigned some archival pieces, such as the magnificent silver biker jacket made of lamé fabric mixed with neoprene. “The concept of sports sewing is the basis of this collection. It is the same key concept that the brand is heading towards. “We are interested in combining different influences through increasingly sophisticated products,” Kapoor told FashionNetwork.com. His brand increased its visibility after the first Milan show, but is still struggling to become a hit in Europe. Dhruv Kapoor is currently distributed through around 15 retailers in Asia, the US and the Middle East, and online at its own e-store, Hypebeast and Zalando.

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The atmosphere was different at JW Anderson. Dressed in a simple sweater decorated with a poinsettia made of bright red fabric attached to the chest, or in a knitted dress, many of the models walking down the catwalk were pantsless and with their legs wrapped in sensual sheer black stockings. with added socks and mules-loafers. with giant tassels on the feet. Others appeared bare-chested, wearing baggy culotte shorts of mauve or lilac wool, trimmed with quilted pink satin like a cushion or curtain, and paired with cardigan jackets of the same hue worn over bare skin.

In some cases, they swapped their elegant sweaters and light gray knit loungewear sets with knit blouses and long johns for a more extravagant shirt with a patchwork and four sleeves, two of them too long and reaching down to the back. With these intimate looks, the new masculinity imagined by Anderson seemed at first glance much more sensual than the feminine silhouettes also present at the show, in which the talented designer presented his brand's pre-fall 2024 women's collection, characterized by tight-fitting dresses. and red velvet. sneakers.

Between the poinsettias, which Anderson, also Loewe's creative director, called “toxic,” and the tights, described as “a second skin and a restriction,” there was an unsettling atmosphere to the collection. It was permeated with “a strange atmosphere of domestic perversion”, inspired by some of Stanley Kubrick's films. It is worth highlighting his last film, Eyes wide Shutreleased in 1999, whose interior scenes featured sets decorated by Christiane Kubrick, the director's painter wife.

“I watched the film again in August and decided it would be the inspiration for the collection, something I had never done before. I was especially obsessed with the Christiane Kubrick paintings that appear in some scenes,” Anderson said. “These colorful figurative paintings, although they served as a backdrop, were an integral part of the psychology of certain scenes and became an essential element of the graphic imagery of the collection,” the brand said in a press release. The images were printed on various knitted dresses.

When leaving home, JW Anderson's men equip themselves with protective clothing. They sport gorgeous navy blue coats with huge lapels, oversized blazers in eye-catching red velvet, and XXL shell-like sports T-shirts, paired with oversized cargo pants and cardigans. As if Anderson had used a wide-angle lens to design this part of the collection.

After the show, it seemed natural for Anderson to invite his guests to the Cineminothe smallest movie theater in Milan, for the screening of a short film about Christiane Kubrick directed by her grandson Jack Elliot Hobbs.