I had washed up in Brooklyn, circa 2009.
Physically, I was in Paris, sitting at the Junya Watanabe fashion show. But spiritually? Oh boy, I was in Williamsburg in the Obama era.
It was the models in their husky Filson jackets, the buffalo checks, the tan cloth bags, the mondo hiking boots and the dark-wash cuffed jeans.
But most of all, it was the feathered-out mountain man beards. I could practically smell the beard oil. I might as well have been getting my haircut at an $80 barbershop on Driggs Avenue while listening to Arcade Fire and drinking an I.P.A. The lumber sexual, folks, is back.
At least in Mr. Watanabe’s hands. The designer, part of the Comme des Garçons extended universe, is a singular force. Thus far in Paris, he is the only designer plumbing our recent hipstery past for inspiration.
Still, it was more than a little disorienting to see the ghosts of the aughts heritage movement — a wave that sent urban-bound men wild for good ol’ outdoorsy essentials like raw denim, Barbour coats and Filson cruiser jackets — revisiting us so soon. Were it 15 years ago, this collection would have received wall-to-wall coverage on “#menswear” blogs like A Continuous Lean. Fashion trends cycle around fast, but really? This fast?
Backstage, Mr. Watanabe dumped some cold Pacific Northwest water on this notion. Yes, he was familiar with the heritage wave that reared up in America two decades ago. There was a similar movement in Japan, he said through a translator.
But that was “not related to this” show.
Rather, Mr. Watanabe said, this collection was a meditation on how much he revered the four-pocket Filson Mackinaw Cruiser, a hip-length coat that was originally patented by the American outfitter in 1914.
He was, he said, “sharing the classic, good old workwear with Filson,” with whom he partnered on the collection.
Sharing, yes. But also reimagining. Each model in the 41-look show wore some twisted conceptualization of a Mackinaw. They came reconstructed, deconstructed, lengthened to a parka, Frankensteined to a shearling, shaved into a blazer-type thing, given a pumpkin orange back panel and worn over another Mackinaw. All that was missing was a Mackinaw mutated into a jumpsuit.
This being a utilitarian design associated with lumberjacks and hunters, it was possible to wonder if Mr. Watanabe was making a grand statement about returning to nature in the face of artificial intelligence onslaughts and the tech oligarchs conquering the world? After all, the first heritage movement came as an answer to the online start-up boom, when men began to crave something analog, something they could feel with their hands, something they could treat like a tool.
Backstage, though, Mr. Watanabe was not in the mood to wheat paste grand ideas onto this collection. The Filson jacket “exists for a long time,” he said, squelching further questions about this temporal trend or that.
Still, near the conclusion of the show, the words “I see a change on the rise” came through on the soundtrack. To my eyes, it was not a change that Mr. Watanabe was offering, but a return, for on Friday morning, the heritage hipster could once again be spotted coming over the horizon.
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