Author: Matthew Hicks

Jean Paul Gaultier doesn’t have a menswear line anymore but most of today’s best menswear lines have a bit of Jean Paul Gaultier.

The migration of avant-garde ideas from the university, the art world and intellectual bohemia towards mass commerce and prime-time television marks the cycle of their cultural acceptance, of what is generally understood to be “mainstreaming.” The people you consider marginal end up shaping the reality of your children. The drag queen your father’s generation had locked up now sells lipstick to your daughter. Progressive minds find this is proof of the positive evolution of society. Which is why it’s so disturbing to hear Jean Paul Gaultier say: “I feel that if I were starting now I couldn’t have done what I had done at the time.” Continue reading “L’Homme Objet: Gaultier’s Male Gaze” →

“Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.”

The quote—inaccurately attributed to both Leonardo da Vinci and Coco Chanel—describes Margaret Howell’s quiet luxuries very nicely. Howell reminds one of an English character in a Henry James novel: a deeply refined sensibility of great influence and means disguised in elegantly modest packaging. Did you know that behind the graciously self-effacing Ms Howell there looms an international fashion empire, built upon exquisite attention to the finer details of British sartorial heritage—one that quietly generates £100 million per year? Probably not. Ms Howell is no showboat. Her collections are season-less meditations on one ever-evolving aesthetic— one that has seduced her customers with its chic pragmatism and hushed sumptuousness. Her MHL line explores an intriguingly handsome re-appropriation of British workwear while her MARGARET HOWELL mainline channels her discreet tastes into high fashion. She was kind enough to sit down for a chat with Dapper Dan. Continue reading “Margaret Howell talks to Matthew Hicks” →

While Romain Kremer’s position as Creative Director of Camper shoes was officialised in 2014, the former CD of Thierry Mugler menswear (as well as his own extremely avant-garde, eponymous label) has an unmistakeable signature that has been present at the Mallorca-based house since his first collaborations with them in 2006. Mr Kremer is an ardent Instagrammer and his website- slash-moodboard (romainkremer.com) is a window into his many tastes and talents. This author remembers being at a fashion event in Paris around 2005 and having a fellow reveller reverently whisper Mr Kremer’s name just as the young designer was making his debuts in the style capital: “You’ll be hearing a lot about Romain Kremer.” His early work is remembered for a darkly sophisticated, if somewhat dystopian, sensual futurism. His creations for his own label mined deep menswear history (think: breeches and tights) in one season only to pivot the next to a radically different style vocabulary (chiselled ephebes in shocking pink or hypertrophic athletic gear, say, or looks that seem to have goose-stepped out of some eroticised future police state). Continue reading “Romain Kremer talks to Matthew Hicks” →

The work of Charles Jeffrey came to our attention at his graduate show for Central Saint Martins, where the young designer showed cream Aran knits interrupted with bursts of violent, primary colours, painters’ jeans stiff with layers of spilled and blended pigments and an innovatively sliding sense of proportion provided by a creative use of loose belting. The London-based, Glaswegian-born night owl is also the driving force behind LOVERBOY. He told us more about this event and his designs when Dapper Dan had the pleasure of interviewing him. Continue reading “Charles Jeffrey talks to Matthew Hicks” →