Lawrence Steele described Aspesi’s offer as: “a kind of uniform, but a vast uniform because we have so many categories and we are always adding and developing them.” That uniform analogy is totally on point because many Aspesi pieces are based on military or workwear. Its field jackets are arguably the brand’s defining pieces.
This collection featured all that core Aspesi goodness in softened but unexpected colorways including lavender, raspberry, and mustard. There was a large section of pieces in nylon, some padded, that had a silky luster but a technical toughness. Breton knits and argyle polo shirts were tweaked ever so slightly with a tufting finish on their defining stripes. Along with the garment dyed linen shirts, a biker in black washed cotton and a parka in Prince of Wales check all looked on the rack as if they had already lived full, rich worn lives. Steele is an expert at giving his garments a kick start of patina before sending them off into the world.
A blue liner jacket in lightly padded cotton featured low pockets edged in the finest wale corduroy. The same piece was delicious in raspberry nylon. An artfully crumpled linen blazer with patch pockets had been expertly dyed to create a subtle iridescent interplay between bronze and blue, depending on the light. Long sleeve linen buttons in floral prints played nicely against the house field jacket in a ripstop mix patterned in an abstracted leopard camouflage: yummy.
Said Steele: “I never want it to have any emphasis in relation to trends or being trendy. It’s supposed to be anti-fashion, in that it’s not something that you follow—instead it follows you.” He added that this season part of his thinking had been a sense of dystopian romanticism, but from this side of the rail it looked not far short of utopian: a wardrobe for life.
