As it celebrates 100 years in menswear, Lanvin uncoupled its fall collections, though artistic director Peter Copping maintained thematic links to his women’s pre-fall collection, whose springboard was a trip to Venice that founder Jeanne Lanvin took with her niece Marianne in the ’20s.
Hence there was some Fortuny pleating on roomy tuxedo pants; mottled prints reminiscent of midcentury Murano vessels on camp shirts, and plush textures galore, including velvet jacquards from Tessitura Luigi Bevilacqua, a Venetian textile firm that dates back to 1499, which Copping reserved for jeans, jeans jackets and slippers, given their heft.
The English designer, who dedicated himself to interiors projects in between his previous fashion gigs at Oscar de la Renta and Balenciaga couture, redecorated one of Lanvin’s showrooms in the style of a gentleman’s living room – a weathered hoodie draped over an Art Deco chair by Armand-Albert Rateau here; a leather pouch propped on a silver plinth there.
There was a slight ’80s vibe to the sweaters with asymmetrical collars and video arcade-esque stripes, and the blousons, pants and T-shirts in an animal print, which winked to the ocelot fur Rateau used to cover the founder’s bidet and toilet lids, on permanent display at the Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris. But Copping mostly plied sophisticated, grownup chic with a timeless, heirloom quality.
Dense, archival embroideries originally intended for cocktail dresses looked cool on dark dress shirts, and a brushed alpaca cocoon coat gave the impression it could be handed down to future generations.
While the house has been weaning itself off its dependence of the Curb skating shoe with its fat laces, Copping introduced a lighter iteration with a sock-like upper, and a new, low-profile sneaker with trapunto stitching that could be its next hit shoe. It’s called the Lnv2.
