“They’re handsome people—handsome girls and handsome boys,” Haider Ackermann said after his show today. Fall marks the designer’s second season combining women’s and men’s on one runway, but he wanted to clarify something about the new collection: “It’s not unisex; it’s about borrowing.” In other words, the patterns are gender specific, but he’s using the same materials for women and men, which gives the clothes their sense of fluidity and interchangeability—and the Ackermann aesthetic its sense of romance.
This was a show in red, white, and black, with only one or two hints of camel and gray. The prints and jacquards (including one spotted on Timothée Chalamet earlier this month at the BAFTAs) were lifted from the patterns of butterfly wings, but the references remained abstract and graphic. Ackermann had Jane and Serge singing “Je T’aime . . . Moi Non Plus” as backup—steamy stuff. But the raffish quality that long defined his work for both genders has been more or less peeled away. What remains is a certain seriousness and rigor—a holdover, maybe, from the 18-month master class in the sartorial arts that was his gig at Berluti.
There was certainly tailoring here at which to marvel. The fitted jackets with the sculptural draped lapels worn by women in chevron stripes, butterfly jacquard, and solid white were impressively elegant. The slouch of robe coats—in white and camel for the ladies, and a vivid shade of red for the gentlemen—was appealing, as well. The image that lingers, though, is the black men’s coat lightly dusted with sequins. We forget, after weeks in the fashion trenches, how something as small as a sequin can destabilize (tired, old) gender conventions. Hopefully one of Ackermann’s handsome boys will take him up on it.
