“This collection is about the idea of persona. When I look back on my life, the influences I had as a child were really strong, so I tried to create the collection with that sense of childlikeness,” Mihara Yasuhiro said backstage before his show. The designer’s own infant child has also begun to develop their own personality recently, which got Mihara thinking about the ways we build our own identities: the parts we show consciously and superficially, and, of course, the parts we try to hide.
“We’re at a time where we have to reconsider what we mean by personality. Even AI has a personality now, so I wanted to think about what makes us human, and express the instability of the human condition,” he continued. Backs were missing from some of the jeans to expose bare skin, or else extra legs sprung out from the front so that they weren’t worn so much as stuck onto the body. A gold sequined dress came with one arm unworn, while shirts and jackets had with extra shirts sewn onto the rear, or were so oversized that the models looked like children wearing adult clothing. The result was a sense of vulnerability, hidden behind the cool-kid edginess that Mihara cultivates so well with his clothes.
And then the party really got started. Halfway through the show, a middle-aged man in a shirt and tie (sat directly behind this surprised reviewer) whipped out a mic and started belting out his best rendition of “Sweet Caroline.” He turned out to be a very nice man from London called Glen, who had been planted in the audience by the Mihara team to perform. Next came Jason in the row opposite, who sang the Four Tops’s “I Can’t Help My Self,” followed by Brian, who gave a crooning rendition of “Daydream Believer” by the Monkees as the models came out of the tinsel curtains and walked the finale. Staff in the rafters threw basketfuls of silver confetti over the scene, and some show goers joined in the singing. It was pure joy in fashion show form, and temporarily transformed the Salle Wagram into a British boozer.
The merrymaking meant that a chunk of the clothes that came down the runway had their limelight stolen—but they were certainly worthy of attention. There were MA1 bombers with triple-layered zippers, super cropped souvenir jackets, and two new models of the designer’s popular melted-sole sneakers. The desire to go back to childhood came through in the smatterings of star and heart stickers on grungy sweatpants, jeans and chore jackets; the bags shaped like dinosaurs and teddy bears; and on sandals with rubber ducks for heels and handbags with bananas for handles. It was good fun, mixed with some interesting statements about what it really means to wear your clothes.
Between each karaoke song, there were pauses filled with foreboding music that changed the mood completely until the next tune started up. It felt like an inevitable kind of encroaching darkness, kept at bay with a song. What else to do but sing along?
