Stella McCartney presented her men’s and Resort collections in Milan with a party at a beautiful garden hidden in the city center. Whimsical paper lamps were strung from trees and pizza was served from street carts, while models played table tennis or lawn bowling or chatted with guests. It was a charming setting, and the collections were delightful, too.
“My menswear is rooted in British tailoring,” said McCartney during a preview. “There’s always this juxtaposition of the masculine with the feminine and of the sport, the street, the city.” All was blended together quite effortlessly: “There’s a nod to the music coming out in the ’90s from London and Manchester,” she continued. “Mixed with this way of wearing tailoring, which is almost ’60s and ’70s England, so classic and with Savile Row exactitude but really with a twist.”
Although the collection’s spirit was one of sophisticated bohemia, it looked quite modern: “It’s really important to me that the menswear is really wearable. I don’t want to see men dressed in lots of the ways I see them on the catwalks; it’s just not my spirit. The man who chooses my designs has a level of confidence and effortlessness, but he’s undone and has a lightness to him and a sense of humor; he’s very comfortable in his own skin. He’s also very mindful and conscious about how to consume, so he can come to us because right now there isn’t really a brand men can go to to be fashionable and sustainable.”
The feel of the collection was definitely balanced, with, for example, the rebellious rock ‘n’ roll spirit of a sharply cut black tuxedo smoothed by a dash of chic. And there was a delicate feel and a subtlety in the tiny decorations embroidered on the collar of a crisp striped poplin shirt, “like going back to the Beatles going to Maharishi,” as the designer highlighted. When military references were in evidence, like in pressed stirrup pants with sporty stripes on the sides, they were handed lightly. “There’s just a little elevation here, but nothing too trying or ridiculous,” she remarked.” The Stella McCartney man is comfortable enough with himself without having to try being fashionable”.
