For years, Marcus Wainwright talked up Rag & Bone’s connection to the street, emphasizing the off-duty IRL-ness of the clothes. The design team wasn’t inattentive to trends, but it certainly didn’t follow them obsequiously. Tried-and-true essentials were the order of the day. So it was no small development to hear Wainwright say at a visit to the brand’s showroom that there’s “a call for more ‘pushed’ fashion on the men’s side.”
As ever at R&B, the foundations are British tailoring, American workwear, a strong Japanese aesthetic most notable via fabrications, and a sport element. But as promised, those foundations were heightened this time around. See the pinstriping on a well-cut coat and the eye-catching color-blocking on strict military shirts, cargo pants, and tennis sweaters.
The bomber with “44” embroidered on the arm that President Obama wore to a college basketball game back in February, nearly breaking the Internet in the process, was cut with a new floral-print lining made from Japanese indigo (and sans the 44 detail). Wainwright and co. made excellent use of fabrics sourced from Japan. Pull-on pants in a faded indigo cotton managed to look both fashionable and essential at the same time. He should add them to the Rag & Bone women’s collection, for sure.
