Kaiser Karl once famously said that his women s collection for Lagerfeld Gallery is the way he would dress if he were a woman. Fair to assume, then, that the corresponding men s collection is aimed squarely at the designer himself. For fall, the point was driven home by belt buckles that shouted "KARL," an ice-pink tie with his name scrawled across it, and the leanness of the tailoring (reflecting M. Lagerfeld s much-publicized trim physique).
But the Lagerfeld man looked slightly askew this season, and it had something to do with the relentless eighties edge of the collection. Sure, there s a wave of bands like Franz Ferdinand and Interpol who are mining this particular corner of pop culture for the mother lode. But the skinny pin-striped suit and white sneaker combo is too purely retro to stand as a contemporary fashion statement. (Joe Jackson is now a nostalgia act, after all.) Pointy white ponyskin loafers paired with narrow trousers didn t help, and neither did the irony of a white hoodie that identified its wearer as a "trustafarian" (i.e., a would-be bohemian supported by a trust fund). Part of the word was picked out in an Yves Klein blue, which also cropped up as the lining of a coat and the New Wave-ish stripe on a tie. Much more promising were a couple of items that featured an updated camouflage print, especially a jacket with knitted cuffs.
