At the end of Pen, the Issey Miyake show for Fall 2011, the models were all handed felt-tips. They turned to the blank wall at the back of the stage and scrawled idiosyncratic graffiti. Miyake designer Dai Fujiwara drew a big fat fountain pen, alongside which he wrote "Get a Pen, Gets friends." That jumbly high-touch-low-tech exhortation was even more meaningful given its source. In keeping with his mentor Issey, Dai is one of fashion s most forward-looking designers, even bringing in revolutionary mathematician William Thurston as the collaborator on one collection. But with his latest men s show, Dai dialed down the futurism in favor of the antique wonders of the written word. His cast of young literary types could have been wannabe novelists in mid-century Paris. The retro cast of their clothes certainly supported that notion, and it made for an appealing take on the 1940 s trend that s nibbling at the edges of menswear for the new season.
Shabby suits, oversize thrift shop coats, big schlumpy knit jackets…a fifth of Scotch and a half-smoked Gitane would have completed the picture. But this ambitious young writer would also have needed something smarter in which to meet a prospective publisher, and maybe even a save-for-best evening ensemble. Dai sensitively offered both. And then—who could possibly want to pursue a theme like that for an entire collection?—he mercifully veered off into Isseyworld and its provocative collages of pattern, shape, and texture. They make this collection a perennial delight, with its acute combination of Western convention and Eastern experiment. An inkblot-printed shirt enlarged on the literary theme, but it also had an un-literary graphism. Equally eye-catching—a chevron-printed puffa, worn over an olive green suit.
