Two and a quarter hours is a long time for any superstar to ask fans to wait for a show to start. But on Saturday night in Cortlandt Alley, a somewhat grimy passageway between Broadway and Lafayette Street in Lower Manhattan, hundreds of people, including Solange Knowles, seemed perfectly happy to wile away the evening in expectation of what was to come.
Namely, Telfar Clemens’s 20th-anniversary fashion show, which was the first official show of his namesake label in almost three years, though “fashion show” was something of a misnomer for the event. Yes, there were clothes involved, and yes, there was a catwalk (or at least the street), and yes, there were people seated on either side along with photographers.
But the parade that finally started at 8:15 p.m. bore about as much resemblance to a traditional fashion show as Mr. Clemens’s signature tank tops — twisted, asymmetric, backless, upside-down — do the standard undergarment. Instead, it was a celebration, a happening and a collective shout of triumph in the face of the current political climate.
Not to mention a reflection of the way Mr. Clemens, who founded his brand on the premise of inclusivity long before D.E.I. was a corporate calling card or a political lightning rod, has redesigned American basics — cutting pants to play peekaboo with the thigh; making athletic shirts into the equivalent of royal robes. Rejecting the traditional system, he built his empire his way, transforming a logo into a not-so-secret password to a world that defines luxury not as a sign of material success, but as being seen. There is a reason he held his show not during the usual ready-to-wear season in September or February, but on the weekend after Juneteenth.
There was not a single department or specialty store buyer in the audience — Telfar does not wholesale its clothes — and there was only a smattering of editors. But there were lots of people toting Telfar bags large and small, and lots of people in Telfar-branded looks, and lots of people hugging and taking selfies together. Over them all, strung like laundry lines between the buildings, hung more of the tank tops, the city’s tenement semiology reinvented as patriotic bunting. The ushers and check-in people wore “I (heart) NY” T-shirts transformed into “I (Telfar logo) NY” T-shirts.
The 200 or so models that finally emerged from the store-cum-hangout Telfar opened last year first strutted down Broadway so passers-by could see the show and then turned the corner up Walker Street, itself crowded with lookie-loos. Finally, they made their way to Cortlandt Alley in a procession of sizes, shapes and ages displaying Mr. Clemens’s body of work — one with its own unique language and increasing range.
There was languid, pajama-like suiting, along with some pieces spattered with big, yellow smiley-face polka dots that echoed the shape of the Telfar logo, and crisp white shirting had the logo picked out like eyelet lace. There were dark stretch-denim flares and jumpsuits with neat white stitching and body-con looks with topographic piping.
There was an assortment of preppy totems like polos and khakis, de- and re-contextualized into something a whole lot more gleefully provocative than what might be seen on a golf course. Even when Mr. Clemens’s logo isn’t plastered all over a garment — and it usually is — it’s easy to recognize his signature.
Oh, and there was a full assortment of bags, including a new “plastic bag,” a shiny, scrunchy nylon tote inspired by plastic deli bags and offered in a variety of colors and slogans, including “Thank you for shopping.” Odds are it will turn into another best seller. (Part of the collection will be available immediately.)
Mr. Clemens’s mother walked in the show, wearing a sky-blue polo stretched into a shirtdress, as did many of his aunts and uncles. So did Raul Lopez, the designer of Luar, in a long white shirt and squishy white pants.
Some of the models were cast after an open call three days before that was televised on Telfar TV, a public access channel the company started in 2022. Viewers got to vote on who would be in the show. Some models toted their dogs, and some brought their children. Some held hands, and some waved to the crowd, which hooted and hollered right back in an acknowledgment that everyone had skin, and maybe family, in the game.
No designer working today understands better than Mr. Clemens that fashion functions as a sign of community and identity. That, as the show notes read, real independence comes from “interdependence.”
No wonder people were willing to wait.
Vanessa Friedman has been the fashion director and chief fashion critic for The Times since 2014.
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