Jonathan Anderson’s spring men’s show for Loewe was all about restraint, a feeling you picked up the minute you arrived at the vast, seemingly empty show space, security guards encircling tiny black metal sculptures of mice on the floor, and a copy of Susan Sontag’s “Against Interpretation” splayed on the hardwood.
Paraded to one of William Basinski’s mournful “Disintegration Loops,” the collection was also an exercise in holding back, with one of the key looks — a slim black suit — and many other silhouettes repeating like Basinksi’s yearning wall of sound.
Long pheasant feathers, often painted gold, were tacked to headbands so they bifurcated or obscured the faces of Anderson’s young models, many of them shirtless and wearing only billowing, draped pants with the leather jacron positioned on the front. Their cap-toed dress shoes seemed a tad too long.
Checkered shorts and taut little polo shirts evoked a suburban picnic circa 1955 one minute, while a biker jacket with the scooped neckline of a cocktail dress suggested a less family-friendly destination the next.
The emotional impact of it all crept up on you, reinforcing that Anderson is one of today’s most daring and erudite designers, and not one to be pigeonholed.
He said his starting point was a 1981 black-and-white photo of a woman’s pump by Peter Hujar, which served as the show invitation, with the original image displayed on an easel propped on the runway.
“I kind of thought, ‘What would a collection be if it was that?’” he said during a post-show scrum. “I wanted something which was nearly very knife-cut.”
He switched gears and talked about some of the granular elements: lauding the lightness and practicality of the spongey silk mohair he used for the tailoring, and describing how he cut the sleeve of a short jacket extra loose and on the curve so it sags out when hands are stuffed in the pocket.
There were blurred nods to English schoolboys and military dress in the Oxford bag trousers and the roomy khaki coats with folded lapels you button through.
Before the show, celebrities, friends of the house and fashion groupies milled about to be photographed in their mask-like sunglasses, “I Told Ya” slogan T-shirts, acid-wash denim and other showy Loewe items.
Save for the ballooning knit pants and gleaming tops resembling the metal wristband of sport watches, this collection spoke far more quietly, exemplified by a gorgeous brown leather coat that was somehow melded to black ostrich skin.
Instead of experiencing the fashion thrills and adrenaline rush Loewe usually delivers, we lived a hypnotic ASMR moment that may well ripple much further.