Toward the end of what we’ll call a grueling Super Thursday at Paris’s men’s shows, designer Isabel Marant was the radiant pep talk personified needed to get back into the game. From within her multi-floor studio, many were commenting on the somewhat unexpected hecticness of the prior eight or so hours. But she, and her Spring menswear collection, lent the marathon a second wind. Basically, and at this point it pretty much goes without saying, Marant really does have a knack for making clothes that people—now very much including men—want to throw (and leave) on. “Most of us,” she said, “we just dress in a good pair of jeans, a good sweatshirt or sweater. We don’t want to pull our hair out over it.”
Her collection, she said, had a twang of a “Cabo-ish, ’80’s feeling, as well as a bit of Americana.” The latter point was seen in patchwork, sun-faded-effect denim jeans and shirting. The former? In lustrous short-sleeve button-downs, and an ornately decorated blue-on-white tunic. There was additionally a clear athleticism, like with a zipped hoodie, color-blocked in washed purple and pink and red, and a simple marant text motif surrounded by lines that reminded of retro corporate design. “The thing,” she added, “is to hope to be doing something right at the end of the day.” At the end of a long day, right she did.
