It has been years since Phillip Lim staged a coed show, and he marked the occasion by choosing a new venue for Spring 2020: an open-air warehouse in Greenpoint. Despite the agonizing traffic to and from the Brooklyn neighborhood—this reviewer barely made it in time from the Lower East Side—the vibe mirrored that of his Spring collection: urban yet somehow tranquil. Backstage, Lim was talking about his brand’s values—community, diversity, optimism—and his efforts to pare things back and create items with a clear purpose.
His experiments with tailoring were Spring’s highlights. You won’t find a conventional two-piece suit here; there are enough of those to go around, for starters, and Lim saw an opportunity to create something different for his clients. His most intriguing proposition was a sleeveless, elongated vest with a detachable piece draped around the shoulders, sort of like a scarf; styled with matching trousers or a flow-y midi skirt, the combination was boundary pushing without being too outré for a typical New York office. (Lim knows precisely who his customers are: working women across a variety of fields.) The same was true of an asymmetrical blazer with sleek cutouts and a detachable hood, as well as a jacket shown with a leather bandana—a clever accessory wearers will be happy to play around with.
Earlier this summer, Lim debuted a Resort collection that was 40 percent sustainable thanks to new organic and recycled fabrics. He continued those efforts here, pointing out the compact organic cotton of a chocolate brown jumpsuit and the coated cupro of a navy midi dress. It had a liquid-y gleam from afar, like heavyweight satin, and in photos it reads almost as leather, but cupro is made from upcycled cotton waste. Materials aside, designing with intention is a smaller yet crucial part of the sustainability conversation. By nixing the unnecessary bells and whistles, Lim hopes to create pieces with serious longevity. Any designer can source better fabrics, but few can resist the urge to complicate their clothes. Going forward, it would be great to see Lim become a louder voice in the sustainability conversation; as he enters his 15th year in business, it will be an important part of maintaining his momentum and staying competitive with the very woke new guard.
