Craig Green A/W 2020 Paris Fashion Week Men’s

Mood board: Green’s first Paris show was themed around notions of intimacy and growth. ‘It started with this idea of packaging a person,’ the designer said backstage. There was an unwrapping of the term ‘the whole package’ – the attitude that the packaging is now more important than what’s inside. This translated into the cashmere dresses at the start of the show that had a protective layer sewn underneath. ’It’s that idea that we dream of wearing cashmere but these are being protected from you as much as you are being restricted from feeling them,’ Green said. He was in an esoteric, sensitive mood. A/W 20 looked at ’love, human relationships, different types of intimacy and our reactions to them.’
Best in show: Ripstop traditionally used for wind sails was employed for coats and trousers so the clothes rustled as the models walked. Plastic tubing was knitted into hats and tabards that bounded as they moved. Larger mechanical volumes twisted. There was a kinetic rigour throughout. The clothes could be pulled up like blinds, creating protective layers around the body. ‘They look like somebody looking out of the window and seeing their reflection at the same time. I also think that windows are really weird – you have them to feel like you are outside, but they are very much a sign that you are inside your house,’ Green said. Elsewhere large flower silhouettes were printed onto tabards and wide pants.
Sound bite: The show’s first section put leather and synthetic together. Green said: ‘People think of Tyvek as an inexpensive disposable material but the leather looked so much like it. That feeling of detachment was important too. Like people falling in love who might have never lived in the same city together or even met! I was interested in that sense of moving through life and collecting things. Outfits that are like multiple garments in the way that we adapt as we grow but still carry everything along with us.’
Craig Green A/W 2020. Photography: Jason Lloyd-Evans
Craig Green A/W 2020. Photography: Jason Lloyd-Evans
Craig Green A/W 2020. Photography: Jason Lloyd-Evans
Craig Green A/W 2020. Photography: Jason Lloyd-Evans
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London based writer Dal Chodha is editor-in-chief of Archivist Addendum — a publishing project that explores the gap between fashion editorial and academe. He writes for various international titles and journals on fashion, art and culture and is a contributing editor at Wallpaper*. Chodha has been working in academic institutions for more than a decade and is Stage 1 Leader of the BA Fashion Communication and Promotion course at Central Saint Martins. In 2020 he published his first book SHOW NOTES, an original hybrid of journalism, poetry and provocation.
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