Discover Officine Generale‘s Spring Summer 2020 La tentation d’une île, en ville collection, inspired by the collective obsession with Summer and escaping the grey weather, presented on Sunday June 23rd, during the recently finished Paris Fashion Week.
SPRING SUMMER 2020 MENSWEAR COLLECTIONS
“I stumbled upon a still from a movie, and a few weeks later we were landing in Ischia, an Italian island. The still was from Plein Soleil. What a cliché, you’ll say, to have a French designer being inspired by Plein Soleil. I started researching and a couple stills from the “American version” The Talented Mr Ripley came up. Let’s not argue on such a beautiful Sunday morning: both movies have tremendous charm and are of endless inspiration. Ischia, what an island.
This season’s challenge was: go from a fantasy, outfits that have become so iconic, to build out a full ready to wear collection, adapted to the city life. I would have loved to have you all in Ischia, with Pasta Vongole and bottom less Spritz Aperol but unfortunately, I was told that the cruise time between the island and Napoli would have made you late for your next show. I hope you’ll travel in your mind by looking at the clothes.
Let’s speak about the clothes now. The colors of the season were born from the buildings. Framework, shutters and frontages eaten by the sun and the sea’s salt. We’ll find washed pastel hues, navy, grey, tobacco and beige. The fabrics are of course light: cotton, métisse (mix) of cotton and linen, linen jersey, seersucker, poplin and fresco wool along with Lyocell. The comfort is made possible by the shapes we decided to work with. Another challenge: to refresh our offering without being dividing. You know the OG’s spirit. Tailoring is coming back in force so let’s have fun with it! On one look you’ll see I added some structure at the shoulders, length to the body and width to the lapels. Speaking about tailoring, we worked on the suits of course, trying to break the “formal” attitude inherent to the double-breasted suit by lowering the buttons’ structure, adding patch pockets and a flat collar. We also worked on bringing back the three-buttons suits, boxier, completely unlined to manage the high temperatures. We worked super hard on the tops, with some great ideas from the team. I wanted to make them strong so that they’ll bring killer attitude without having to wear a blazer. Flat collars, polo collars in touch with what we want to wear today. Please look for the super nice short sleeve shirts with mini bib and a button to have a new take on the Mao collar.
Style consultant: Benoit Bethume
Stylist: Marine Lescieux
Hairstylist: Ed Moedlands
Make Up artist: Nina Haverkamp
Casting Director: Paul Louisor
Production: Eyesight
Musique: Mode-F
Video: Titre Provisoire
Images Courtesy of © PR Consulting Paris / Officine Générale
