BACKSTAGE
ON THE RUNWAY
THE AFTER PARTY
I must say that I really enjoyed this show, which was a bit
of a surprise for me because I was not the biggest fan of their previous range
earlier this year at Joburg fashion week, but I found this to be such a
youthful and exciting move-on from that range. As shitty a dresser as I often
am (which is why you never see me on Skattie), I’m still quite critical of SA
menswear designers. Yes I know that SA menswear fashion tends to move really
slowly or rather the customer takes time to adapt to new trends. And there’s
the “okes” for whom the golf shirt is the height of fashion. I remember from my
days as a fashion buyer, I bought mostly ladieswear but the one year I bought
menswear, that year almost crushed my soul. The thing with fashion buying for a
national retailer, you’re not just buying for a niche fashionable market but
you’re buying to satisfy a mass market. Imagine trying to satisfy as large an
amount of SA men as possible (no not that way, get ur mind out the gutter), by
the end of it I just wanted to vomit all over striped golf shirts and cargo
shorts. On the positive side though the experience brought me a little closer
to knowing who the actual SA menswear customer is, rather than the fantasy idea
we sometimes entertain in our heads.
Anyway, I digress, back to Csquared. Firstly let’s get the
obvious bit out of the way. Yes, there was a lot of colour blocking, which we
know a lot about and therefore not a major fashion revelation. There was print
blocking by way of checks and stripes, which I thought gave a fresh spin to the
colour blocking whilst entertaining a newer trend at the same time. And I do
love the bold brights, as compared to the current crop of veggie tones in
menswear colour blocking. And of course, as has been a trend for a while now at
menswear shows there were a lot of bowties (that’s my meh moment). But what made the show stand out for me was
the execution, the boldness and the youthfulness of this range. The use of the colours, the prints and the
styling made this feel like a proper range and not a bunch of best selling
pieces and new-ish pieces that a designer might put together just to show them
off. I also think the range shows a brand that has developed a clear
understanding of its market, they are not about totally re-inventing the wheel,
but rather exploring current trends and interpreting them in a way that suits
their customer and keeps them up to date, whilst attracting a whole new bunch
of customers. And honestly I see the pieces in this range fitting quite nicely
in a lot of trendy SA men’s wardrobes this summer.
I believe that in SA we not only need to grow the fashion
industry but also that we need to grow the market that buys the ‘fashion’
items. Part of getting that trick right is balancing the needs of the SA
customer with the hot global fashion trends. And this for me has been the best
effort at getting that balance right that Csquared has made in recent times. In
my opinion of course.
