Diesel Black Gold S/S 2018

Mood board: For the first time since taking over the creative direction of the brand in 2013, Andreas Melbostad showed his menswear and womenswear collections together. Add to this the fact that his references for the collection sit comfortably in the nineties and you have two of the prevailing themes of the last few seasons. The traditional showing and buying schedule is exhausting an already fatigued system, and the nineties are now officially long enough ago to be a sound point of reference. The show opened with four women’s looks – grunge plaid slip-dresses worn over long-sleeve jerseys and flat boots – a look both of the moment and of the past.
 
Scene setting: Melbostad, who lives in New York, took the collection to the streets with the runway built to resemble a concrete sidewalk. Set in the middle of a large industrial building, the models walked to the stirring instrumental composition, Clubbed to Death by Rob Dougan, which was used in the 1999 sci-fi film The Matrix. The staging created an upfront, punchy mood.
 
Finishing touches: Elsewhere designers have focused their attentions on developing lightweight fabrics and easy wear materials designed for warmer climes. Diesel is known primarily for its tough leather jackets and hardy denims and so embraced a more layered look for summer. The models wore slim ski-cum-surf pants underneath leather culotte shorts, three-quarter length sleeve parkers and jackets over multi-striped jumpers and jersey separates. Colours went from black to blue, aqua to wine. Stand out were the roomy cargo pants in heavy denim and lightweight technical nylon.