Phillip Lim, the renowned fashion designer, is breaking with tradition at New York Fashion Week. Since the start of the pandemic, he has kept a low profile, only appearing in the front row at his friends’ shows. This season, however, he is taking a different approach, hosting a pop-up gallery on the Lower East Side to showcase the work of Japanese photographer Jiro Konami.
Lim has given Konami five pieces from his fall collection and asked him to take to the streets to create impressionistic images of New York City. This impromptu collaboration aims to capture the energy and synchronicity that the city is famous for.
The designer’s collection also reflects this spirit, with a series of unexpected and pleasing mashups. A standout piece is a pair of dresses that combine clashing florals and Chinatown shopping bag checks. The designer drew inspiration from the book “Chinatown Pretty“, which celebrates the street style of senior citizens in North American Chinatowns.
In addition to these dresses, the collection features hoodies made from washed denim, a schoolgirl pinafore with a leather bodice, and puffers with peacoat collars. Lim’s expertise in outerwear is also on display, with an oversize washed denim chore jacket and a shrunken leather biker jacket. The designer has also added schoolboy blazers to the mix, complete with a 3.1 Phillip Lim crest reading “The City that Never Sleeps“.
In a nod to pre-fall, Lim has also referenced Lady Liberty with upside-down crown-shaped darts to create the shape of a skirt and incorporated the lights of the Empire State Building as lightweight tinsel fringes on an evening slipdress.
