Strength and Vulnerability at Kiko Kostadinov

March 06, 2024

For their FW24 collection, Kiko Kostadinov is all about balance and dichotomy. Showing in Paris, twin sisters and designers Laura and Deanna Fanning play with hard and soft. Regarding their conception of “The Kiko Kostadinov woman,” this collection is meant to exist at the “tipping point of her strength and vulnerability.”

Some looks featured pastels and draped sheer fabrics, others featured stiff, armored silhouettes and earth tones. There’s something that feels vaguely geometric about this season’s work — from graphic distortion to fabric sculpting and anatomical augmentation, the entire collection is a game of the eye. But that doesn’t mean the pieces aren’t wearable. A three-piece denim suit comes out of a collaboration with Levi’s and the debut of the carry-all Mezulari bag is a stylish take on the utilitarian messenger. Kiko Kostadinov sums their work up best: “A variety of desires play out; intact or wounded, tender or aggressive serving as distinct markers of vulnerability within us.”

By Izzy Capulong
Photography by Boris Halas

Check out the looks below

Fashion

Livestream: Zegna Summer '25

The livestream for the menswear brand's runway show for their L'Oasi Di Lino summer collection below streamed from Milan on Monday, June 17th at 4pm CET / 10am EST and has now ended.

Watch the recording below:

Fashion

Gucci Past, Present, and Future: F/W 2024 Menswear

View a selection of the images from Gucci's fall/winter menswear campaign below:

Fashion

Laura Andraschko SS25

June 12, 2024

At London Fashion Week earlier this week, creative director Laura Andraschko unveiled her latest collection, an overtly political presentation, featuring on-the-nose critiques of the UK upper class’ culture and attitudes.

Andraschko, whose work is typically hedonistic in nature, has taken a left turn for the SS25 collection. The excess and ignorance of the often conservative upper class woman is mocked mercilessly. Faux country club pieces are embroidered with phrases like “Entitled Cunt”, offering unabashed, humorous criticism of elites in line with the trend found in recent films The Menu and Triangle of Sadness.

To frame her theatrical show of ridicule, Andraschko chose horse stables in West London as her location, a perfect encapsulation of the bullshit behind the shiny artifice of the lifestyle Britain's elites have chosen for themselves. The designer isn’t portraying herself as a hater through-and-through, though, as elements of the collection display a deep seeded love for aspects of British culture and fashion. Equestrian wear is included, along with pieces invoking UK country club’s and upper class business wear.

Some pieces evoke the well-known Bullingdon Club, which counts Prime Ministers such as notorious right-wing buffoon Boris Johnson and conservative clown David Cameron as it’s former members. Although the collection s a scathing critique of the rich, it’s also tinged with hope, paving an absurd path forward in the arts, a much needed reprieve in a time of ever-increasing inequality.