A traveler wanders from the banks of the Loire to Ulan Bator…
This long journey took him from European cities along the Danube, through landscapes of forests, meadows and plains. Then, beyond Minsk and Novgorod, beyond the Urals, the taiga, the steppe, Central Asia and its wide-open spaces.
His clothes reflect the story of this long, initiatory journey, borrowing the colors of time and landscape: water-green pastels, lichen and moss green, mustard, a palette of browns and rusts, a symphony of deep blues.
Twenty long, slender silhouettes, the quintessence of the season’s collection, offer a snapshot of German-Pratin chic, a modern cultural interpretation of allure and distinction.
At first, the Saint-Germain-des-Prés-style suits reveal themselves: high buttoning and an enhanced waistline for straight 2 or 3-button jackets, narrow, slim shoulders, close to the body and natural, olive-toned sleeve caps that allow for gestures.
These supple French-style jackets with open, slightly plunging fronts, reminiscent of eighteenth-century chasuble, reveal flat, high-rise, tapered pants, narrow at the bottom and brittle on the shoe, most worn with suspenders.
The focus is on rich, noble English and Irish fabrics and material effects: sheets in colorful stripes, dyed flannels, a jumble of tweeds, shetland, lambswool and cashmere…
The shirts, treated in the finest cottons, cashmere and silk, feature real work on the collar, underbuttoned, English, with half-moon flap or blunt point.
A symbol of elegance and an integral part of the Arnys identity, the jacket sleeves always have 4 buttons, 3 of which can be buttoned.
The jacket is worn with a single orphaned buttonhole on the right and two on the left on the watch side, suggesting the double – sometimes single – cuff of the shirt. The cuff is embellished with cufflinks, gold and hard or precious stones, the only jewelry that today’s man can reasonably afford.
An alternative to the city suit, the garment becomes more nonchalant for a different kind of city wear. Enter the Saint-Germain-des-Prés line of Mongolian-inspired jackets, quilted and twisted in superb weaves, with details in topstitched leather used for saddlery and belts. Refinement lies in the workmanship of the linings, sometimes quilted lengthwise in the Chinese style, and the use of swakara, a fine curly lambskin typical of Breitschwanz, for collars and facings.
In fine, this long journey provides the opportunity for a reception. It’s time for the formal black tuxedo in fine, supple black alpaca/mohair with bow and satin belt. The other two proposals, an elegant contemporary offering, are the short jacket with buttoned facings like a boatman’s jacket, as well as the Indian-inspired “Cornac” jacket, revisited here for evening with a small satin collar.
Once again, Maison Arnys takes us on a journey full of poetry, music and dandyism. Far from the hasty canons of modernity, the Arnys man is a man of values, a man of history, a man of adventure.
Pascal Iakovou
Cette publication est également disponible en : Français (French)
