British menswear has always been known for his eccentric and masculine designs. However, this year gender-fluidity seemed to be more present in many of the top designer’s fashion collections at the London fashion show.
Arguably, a new generation of fashion designers have taken a gender-neutral stance with their designs this year, which can only be seen as a empowering display.
One notable collection came from the Art School, which is the brainchild of Eden Loweth and Tom Barrett, who studied fashion at Ravensbourne and art criticism at Central Saint Martins respectively.
In an exploration of non-binary gender identities, models of all shapes and sizes wore one armed leotards, nude stocking dresses over brightly coloured satin shirts and pleated skirts and jackets in college stripes, all styled with black kitten heel boots.
Other young labels such as Rottingdean Bazaar and newcomer Stefan Cooke have also swiftly established reputations for clothes that push at ideas of what menswear – or indeed clothes – can be. Cooke, by contrast, felt positively conventional despite male models dressed in skintight python-printed jeans, carrying handbags.
Many of the designs from the Men’s London fashion week included more gender-fluidity, diversity and opposed traditional and societal views of masculinity in fashion and these ‘controversial’ designs were only met with critical acclaim from the audience attending the show. Hopefully this empowering embrace of gender-fluidity in men’s fashion wear will only continue to be in trend in future collections.
> Maria Collins
