How London Fashion Week: Men's Gave Deeper Meaning to "The Culture"

From the outside — which realistically is where most of us reside — fashion, the fashion industry and the concept of “Fashion Week” in particular, can seem nothing short of opaque: a machine that gives the impression of being purely self-serving, removed from the concerns of the world-at-large. And, as much as it remains a sweeping generalization, perhaps there is some truth to this — particularly where the world of high fashion is concerned.

But there have always been exceptions. Fashion, as much as it may exist in a bubble, does not exist in a vacuum. The much-touted and long-running activism of designers such as Vivienne Westwood, references that pervaded Raf Simons’ Spring/Summer 2018 collection for Calvin Klein and Blade Runner-infused eponymous range for the same season, and the meme-ready sensibilities of Demna Gvasalia speak to an understanding of fashion’s place within culture (pop and otherwise) and as part of a wider social structure.

With that in mind, it’s perhaps fair to say that 2017 marked something of a tipping point for fashion as it did for other industries with high-profile social movements and political events permanently changing the landscape, making it — if not impossible — at the very least conspicuous when engagement is not deemed to be a priority.

Barely a week of 2018 passed it’s perhaps no surprise that the first London Fashion Week: Men’s of the yearproved that fashion can — and should — be a part of this dialogue, with designers as sartorially diverse as Paria Farzaneh, Christopher Raeburn, Charles Jeffrey and Grace Wales Bonner all injecting their shows and collections with the kind of cultural weight and depth of thought that fashion is all too often (and all-too-often wrongly) accused of lacking.

With London’s hosting duties now over, we cast an eye back at some of the designer’s who set their minds to changing the minds of others.