The front row at Amiri included Maluma, Octavia Spencer and Quavo, but all eyes were on Mike Amiri’s parents, attending their first Paris Fashion Week. Iranian immigrants who moved to Los Angeles before he was born, they appeared visibly moved as their son embraced them while taking his bow.
“My dad, he’s never been to a show in Paris, and he knows I’ve done well for what I do, but he’s never got to see what it really means — and it was really his dream also,” Amiri said backstage. “They’re kind of blown away.”
The designer said his dapper dad was a “huge influence” on his designs. But whereas his label often mines a sunny, nostalgic vision of L.A., this season he wanted to explore the city’s louche underbelly.
“There’s something dangerous about these characters here, and the places they go. They’re not dressed for the dinner, they’re not dressed for the party — they’re dressed for the after party, they’re dressed for the rooms where there’s just a few people, and I love that idea,” he explained.
Amiri opened the coed display, held on another day of sweltering temperatures in Paris, with a slick gunmetal suit that could have walked straight out of “American Gigolo.” The early ‘80s movie, starring Richard Gere and a legendary wardrobe by Giorgio Armani, was on his mood board this season, inspiring some of his best tailoring to date.
The designer traded the old-school draped jackets of recent seasons for more precise shoulder constructions and high-waisted, creased pants designed to elongate the leg — pairing them with pointy boots for extra California swagger.
He amped up the lacquer and shine with iridescent fabrics like Lurex-woven linen and silk, or a houndstooth wool coated with transparent sequins — as well as his first fine jewelry collection, developed with Yves Spinelli and Dwyer Kilcollin of the Los Angeles jewelry brand Spinelli Kilcollin.
Patchwork leather or satin embroidered jackets brought to mind another film character: Ryan Gosling’s taciturn hero in “Drive.” That film’s neon-drenched aesthetic reverberated through python-print pants, zebra-patterned knits, and silky shirts worn open to the navel.
Asked if he has a rule for how many buttons to unbutton, Amiri laughed. “Usually I’ll just go for the extra one. You know what: why not just be a little bit sexy? It’s a little dewy out, the skin’s a little wet. We might as well take advantage of that,” he quipped.
