Daniel Gayle, the designer behind the London menswear label Denzil Patrick, is pretty nifty when it comes to naming his collections. This spring was dubbed London Belongs To Me, while for fall he came up with the equally evocative All Dressed Up and Somewhere To Go. That sense of evocation is two fold. For one, with All Dressed Up…Gayle has tapped into the coming season’s new mood for menswear: a bit more glam, a bit more peacocking, and a whole lot more newness when it comes to tailoring. And evocative because Gayle is canny in a whole other way too. There’s a rich sense of narrative going on here, personal and reflective, emotive and joyful. And that could be exactly the right approach to be taking now as a tiny indie in a world of behemoth megabrands: To make your label meaningful, tell your own story, not anyone else’s.
In Gayle’s case, that always starts with family, with all the love, connection, and complication that entails. With All Dressed Up… the starting point was an image of his mother taken during the very early ’80s in the multicultural south London neighborhood of Brixton. And, another earlier family snapshot from the ’40s, of his grandmother glammed up to go shopping in London’s West End, a photograph brimming with the palpable and recognizable thrill of having made the effort and turned yourself out in style in a sartorial rebuke to whatever else is going on in your life. “I’d spent so much time talking about my grandfathers, Denzil and Patrick [hence the label name],” he said, laughing, “I wanted to give a nod to the powerful women in my life.”
That led him to think about the family home in Brixton; to the very fabric (literally and metaphorically) of the domestic environment—the carpets and net drapes—that have become the prints for red or silver gray plush velvet jackets and silken shirts, or lace wrap dresses which can be layered with sharp jackets and pants with a snug-fit higher waistline. The tailoring was inspired by his snappily suited young Mod uncles, while his fake furs (made from deadstock fluffy stuff) came from that image of granny.
In effect, there’s a whole generational and gender interplay going on here. That’s powering a lot of fashion these days, but Gayle’s is specifically familial. You don’t need to know anything about the Gayle clan to feel the emotional resonance in these clothes, but it’s there, and it makes his work all the more compelling for it. Make fashion, but make it feel, is the message here—like the familiar comfort of Gayle’s cozy Aran cardigans, which have been recycled from vintage ones, then re-dyed in the most gorgeous shades of scarlet and emerald. It’s creative ambition informed by emotion.
Elsewhere, Gayle delved again, as he has done in the past, into his early dance training, giving a nod to the the brilliant, Puck-ish Scottish choreographer Michael Clark, who danced with Leigh Bowery and in BodyMap (the bodysuit the cult ’80s London duo designed for Clark featured cut-outs, memorably including one exposing his ass). That led Gayle to explore how fit and freedom of movement can work together—that very au courant wider, sloping shoulder, or the narrow, warm-up pant leg, or the deep curving armholes on a pale mauve duchesse satin tee that’s been spangled with jewels. That’s not the only decorative flourish. Equally personal, Gayle’s partner, the artist James Bosley, sketched a sassy character called Lydia, all Jessica Rabbit curves and Riot Grrrl attitude, who appears on the likes of a sweater with an exposed back. So, yes, all dressed up, to be sure, and with enough thought and imagination to suggest these clothes are definitely going somewhere.
