At a preview the day before his show, Antonin Tron, the talented designer behind the label Atlein, mused on the inspiration for his Spring 2018 collection: the power of memory, its place in his life—and our lives—and the way it can power the imagination. That’s pretty heady stuff, no pun intended. Yet, it’s also an apt reminder that this young Frenchman’s creation of corporeal fashion—he’s marked himself thus far as highly gifted at shaping and molding jersey around the body—comes from a cerebral place, the sensuality of his clothes spun from a sensitive intelligence. The memories that formed Spring 2018 ranged from his grandfather, whom Tron was close to, and who died when the designer was relatively young; to the sense of identity, both personal and national; and on to the yearnings of his postadolescent years, which took him to exploring the freedom of club culture. Freedom then, and freedom now, perhaps, since this season Tron was also intent on transcending the tag of being the “jersey designer,” of which more later.
Still, it might not be that fruitful here to try to spin any of those memories to specific moments in the collection, though the excellent veiled jersey polo shirts and crisp topstitched navy trousers offered a link to the incessant beat of after-dark havens. The show did, however, offer a moment of collective fashion memory, via the casting of model Georgina Grenville, iconized as one of Tom Ford’s earliest Gucci girls, and looking terrific here in a look that’s quickly gathering pace as key for next year: the intricate top—Tron’s twisted and turned colorful fil coupe with bands of jersey—and lean, lean, lean pants.
It was the opening that revealed something of Tron’s ambitions for Atlein. Eschewing the manipulation of one of fashion’s most tricky fabrics to work with (jersey) until later in the show, Tron tried his hand at tailoring, using a sandy-beige cotton drill for curvaceous field jackets, some with a deftly rendered off-kilter quality to them, with asymmetrical tabs and button fastenings, as well as skinny Bermuda shorts, and yet more of those narrow trousers, these with a cool utility vibe to them. Like much else of what was on offer here, they worked—and were an apt reminder that if you want to have some new memories to treasure, then you’ve got to take some risks. Even better when they pay off.
