The feelings of distance caused by the pandemic only intensify as it drags on. “I haven’t seen my family since early February last year, just because of distance and quarantine and all those things,” said Luke Meier on a video call from Milan. An ocean away from his native Canada—and communicating through satellites and digital connections—you imagine a boy could feel a bit lost in space, sitting in a tin can far above the world. Perhaps that’s what unconsciously imbued his and Lucie Meier’s Jil Sander collection with a certain alien sensibility.
Shot in the derelict Château de Franconville north of Paris, a sombre short film showed models wandering around its dilapidated salons in sober humdrum. There were a few of them there, but the mood was unmistakably solitary. Expressed through the Meiers’ puritanical lens, our moment in time had inspired a collection nestled in the desire for tactility, cosiness and self-protection that defines it. “I’m sure a lot of people have brought up the context of where we are since the pandemic started,” said Luke, referring to his designer peers, but that didn’t make it any less pertinent to our evolving wardrobe.
Between their enveloping wool coats, elongated tailoring, roomy knitwear, fluid overshirts and comforting knitted collars, a more abstract interpretation of our wardrobe mindset than mere ‘comfort-wear’ took shape. Clinical wellies in dusty tonal colors evoked those worn with quarantine suits in science fiction (think secret alien desert station on the X-Files)—an image echoed in a shiny-coated cotton coat—and leather sashes easily conjured visions of spaceship uniforms. Most expressive of the feeling were woven metal necklaces and breastplates, and primitive pendants that spelled out “Mother.” Cue Lieutenant Ripley.
Irresistible references aside, the pieces spelled out the emotions of solitude and loss of familial contact Luke was talking about. “The letter forms are very simple. It’s the feeling he could have just found the metal and made it himself. But it’s very close on his body,” Lucie said. Sewn onto coats and knitwear were panels of frayed canvas printed with photographic portraits of flamboyant young female art students at the Bauhaus shot by Florence Henri in the 1920s. Worn by the un-eccentric young men that made up the cast, the effect wasn’t camp but very human; the male idea, perhaps, of missing a formidable female family member or friend. “It’s a show of familial affection,” Luke noted.
The Meiers’ deeply serious design practice can feel stark or cold, but between its muted colors and themes of loneliness and longing there was an expressed emotional core to this collection that gave it warmth. “There’s a certain personal approach here. I try most of the things on, and I wear most of the pieces,” Luke said. It was a human touch partly communicated through an alien one, but as we know, even E.T. was dying to phone home.
