WATCH IT NOW - Alexander McQueen | Menswear Spring/Summer 2018

Tailoring starts out clean, almost puritanical; austere. Precisely cut double-breasted jackets are worn over ivory leather bib-fronted shirts with slim fitted trousers finished with a broad, leather stripe. Long tailored coats with peak lapels and equally pared down trouser suits are cut in bonded black and scarlet leather. Outerwear is re-constructed: pieced and patched in camel and differing scales of Prince of Wales check in graphic shades of black, scarlet and ivory. An oversized cotton gabardine trench coat is reversed and inset with a wool silk jacquard patchwork of contrasting check. Cotton broderie anglaise shirts are paired simply with white poplin cropped trousers or layered with Fair Isle-inspired knits, one of which is pieced and patched together from socks, the once heel now forming the elbow.

Folk red and navy stitch embroidery is placed across white oversized oxford shirting worn with relaxed pyjama trousers. Leather trompe I’oeil puffer jackets are paired with quilted silk trousers and climbing rope belts. The perfecto is pieced and patched: studded, zipped and buckled with a protective shearling lining or panelled in red. A Guernsey-inspired ivory hand knit hoodie is worn with selvedge Japanese denim embroidered with contour maps and ‘explorers’ notebook’ specimen sketches. More orienteering maps and plant studies are hand stitched and printed onto a white leather explorer cape, selvedge denim jumpsuit and oversized hooded wool felt sou’wester with trailing blood red threads. 

Woven jacquards are reversed; their perfect surface is worn close to the skin. Loose threads of silk and wool hover over a reversed carpet distressed jacquard evening coat. Tree of Life silver bugle and glass bead embroideries with trailing silk and cotton threads adorn an elegant wool evening jacket and coat.

Fragments of Rudyard Kipling’s 1898 poem, The Explorer, are printed and embroidered across clothing and accessories throughout.