Earlier this week, an accessories editor at a major magazine told me she was forced to ask the staff s stylists to stop using Alexander Wang s lace-up sandal boot from Spring 2009 in their shoots. Consider that: a contemporary designer snagging a seasonal honor—Most Favored Editorial Shoe—usually taken by the likes of Balenciaga or Louis Vuitton.
Defined purely by price point, his is a contemporary brand. But it s a label Wang politely chafes at, and over the past three seasons he s become sui generis: a designer with the creative chops to increasingly earn a place in high fashion s conversation, but whose clothes are accessible to more than just the one percent.
Situated at this powerful vantage point, Wang chose Wall Street s Masters of the Universe as his starting point for Fall. He took the traditional banker s suit—a push into uncharted territory for this Master of the T-shirt—and deconstructed it in a dark and sexy vein. It was "about growing up, about progress," Wang said before the show. "It s a lot more sophisticated, more polished." Polished yes, but hardly proper. Wang knows his girl, and she s not following the office dress code.
Cropped blazers, tailcoats, and vests exposed slivers of skin and were worn with thick ribbed thigh-high legwarmers, often yanked down over chunky heels. Matching backpack straps were crisscrossed in front to give a bondage vibe. Layering was part of the story, but Wang s goal was to do it in a more precise, less street-chic manner, slicing away extraneous elements. A key part of that was his new trouser, a sort of glorified belled legging that his leggy front-row fans will no doubt jump all over.
Perhaps as a counterpoint to his gray flannel inspiration, Wang also made the case for velvet in all forms, including chenille. That seems a tough sell, even for him. Then again, there s a good likelihood that the growing number of worldwide Wang-ettes—some of whom surely caught the show live-streamed on SHOWstudio or on the massive American Eagle LED billboard in Times Square—will love every little bit.
