From bilious dandy to sartorial skin(ny)head, this Maison Margiela man ran a consumptive masculine gamut. Seventies-touched, vaguely pimp, flash-collared leather jackets and Mystery Machine floral trousers edged in a dirtily hippie direction, augmented by a psych-acid soundtrack and Primal Scream's sample of Peter Fonda's demand to get loaded and have a good time. But this was a broader non-proposition in which stitched-sole boots were the only near-constant. A shirtless double-breasted pale suit and overcoat made for a startlingly conventional look, bar the snarl and the smears of paint and the threatening glint of hardware at the model's hand. Coats in treated drill or wool mix had satin-shine strips down the spine or at the pockets, sometimes touched by that floral. Were these abstracts of different artists at work, perhaps with a couple of suits thrown in for the incoming creative director (that would be John Galliano, who as far as could be ascertained was not involved in this collection)? A sense of a narrative slipped from grasp as each look slipped past, but once you stopped hoping for coherence—even coherent incoherence—there were some fine pieces here: the leather coats, some boxy macs, free-falling ultra-volume trousers with belt loops maybe 8 centimeters wide. And the two canvas coats that looked lovingly stitched from unloved paintings picked up from Clignancourt were fantastic objects. This was a trip, all right—but it could have used a destination.
