A vibrant pink line of fabric—a third of a mile of it—undulated through a field of purple lavender, up and over a hill to meet bright blue Provençal sky. Bees were buzzing, white umbrellas were handed out against the sun. Then in the distance, a column of people started to walk over the horizon, led out by someone in a dazzling oversized white jacket with a streak of sheer lace beneath. It took a good few seconds to realize that the beautiful androgyne was Mica Argañaraz—she could have been a boy or a girl. The prosaic gendering questions of the season had finally melted away in the dazzling heat.
Simon Porte Jacquemus was marking his first decade as a designer with an epic coed show on his home soil. “I wanted it to look like a David Hockney painting or a Christo installation through the fields,” he said. “With lots of prints. A painting within a painting, in a field. Provençal Pop!”
That he has the wherewithal and the influence to attract an army of attendees from all continents to converge on this far-flung lavender field says everything about the charm, desirability, and power of his brand of youthful Frenchness. “I wanted something sophisticated but at the same time as light as a cocktail in summer,” he said backstage before the show. It was a tented village over the brow of the hill, in soaring heat. “Everything that means everything to me is from here. Please don’t call me Parisian! I am from the South of France.”
His show happened to round off the European menswear season, but this was a one-shot Jacquemus show for Spring 2020; he won’t be participating in the September Paris women’s season. Who cares? This is by far the best way to see Jacquemus and all it’s become—a preternaturally mature brand with signatures and quirks all its own.
There they were, parading through the lavender—great loose, tailored suits that could work on anyone (like the blue-and-white scribbly flower-printed version); hyper-sexy modern peasant dresses with ribbon straps to tie and untie; sheer knits; the art-heel shoes he’s invented; and the funny proportions of bags, from a shoulder tote as big as a tent to a “granny’s cake-tin” dangling from straps.
It was the first time he’s shown menswear with womens, and you could see the points—all the squared-off printed shirts and canvas jackets—where the clothes could easily be shared. How was it, thinking about both together? “It was so much easier and a big pleasure for the whole studio,” he said. “The women gave so much to the men, and the men to women. But I always do things without trying too hard.”
So much of the conversation of the past few weeks has been about the escape from dystopian angst, the return to childhood, and the longing for youthful fun. Well Jacquemus doesn’t need to theorize or theme around any of that; his brand genuinely is it: youth, sexiness, fun, and optimism bottled. Sales, he says, are soaring.
As the whole gang migrated into a wheat field for his all-night festival of a party, he took a moment to reflect. “I always want to give a message that’s positive to the young generation: ‘Look, I am self-made, it’s possible!’ ” he said. “I want to bring the sunshine—that’s it.”
