It’s a milestone year for Grace Wales Bonner, who’s marking a decade in business and plans to stage a celebratory runway show in Paris in June. For fall, though, she’s kept things low-key, with showroom appointments — but that doesn’t meant the collection is any less rich.
She described the collection as “a romantic vision of the artist at work,” and drew inspiration from a real artist, the Chicago-based Theaster Gates, in addition to mining his extensive archive of vintage Ebony and Jet magazines for her cool photographic prints.
She worked once again with the Savile Row tailor Anderson & Sheppard, and with Crombie, the storied British menswear brand best known for its elegant wool topcoats. She even added dashes of bright color — such as sizzling pink — from her Adidas Originals collection.
The designer mixed utilitarian and soft-edged looks to great effect, adding a fluffy white shearling collar to a tough black bomber jacket, and satin lapels to a melton wool peacoat. In a signature move, she slipped a cotton lace T-shirt under a traditional navy coat with satin details.
There were artier pieces, too, including a draped, textured satin and viscose shirt adorned with a magazine cover portrait. Another shirt, overdyed in an intense shade of indigo, bore the same image of a lovely ’60s-era model, in a repeating pattern. The pink T-shirt from the Adidas collection rounded out the collection’s rich color palette.
Footwear — for both men and women — also had an arty bent. There were flat, patent leather studded boots and mary jane sneakers done in Neoprene and suede with a gold leather strap. It was beautiful — and sensible — footwear for all those artists who spend long hours on their feet, running creative marathons.
