With the end of Paris Fashion Week, the presentation of men’s collections in the European fashion capitals came to a close. Returning, for the most part, to the format of the fashion show in the presence of the public, there is also a return to the great events typical of high fashion, such as the catwalk punctuated by Hollywood stars for Prada or the corresponding call to gen-z signed Dolce&Gabbana with a performance by a Machine Gun Kelly dressed in sequins. However, the highlight of the season was the last Louis Vuitton fashion show signed by Virgil Abloh, the last journey into his dream world.

We present here a selection of the six events to remember from the Men’s Fall/Winter 2022 collections.

At the Prada Foundation’s Depot, the collaboration between Miuccia Prada and Raf Simons continues with a tribute to work and everyday life. This reality bursts into the aesthetic vernacular of the fashion show. On a stage reimagined for the occasion by AMO, the models – which include internationally renowned movie stars – parade down an illuminated path in which the representation of current events is amplified by cinema seats for the guests, who thus become mirrors of reality. Moving away from conversations about comfort and loungewear, Prada presents a collection firmly anchored in work, where sartorial labor works on a formality that lends importance. Therefore, these are clothes, purely utilitarian, where exaggerated leather trench coats, asymmetrical blazers accented with shearling bands, brightly hued pants, and shiny overalls emphasize the body by outlining the shoulders and waistlines, almost like architectural volumes.

With her latest work, Silvia Venturini Fendi, reimagines a gentleman's wardrobe, using a playful formality that recalls old world elegance. Accompanied by dry ice and a restless direction of lights, the models speed past on metal podiums that trace the brand’s logo - designed by international studio Bureau Betak. Only seemingly a straightforwardly sentimental take on the classic, the collection gives each outfit an anti-conventional twist, blending occasion wear with the surreal and ironic. In a dandy flourish, loose-fitting coats were pinned with corsets, while Mary Jane shoes were laced with wristwatch straps.

The British designer – who recently inaugurated the brand in the Nft universe, with a patchwork cardigan that became popular on Tik Tok thanks to singer Harry Styles – continues his digital experimentation by releasing short films of female avatars in anticipation of the Milan fashion show. But Jonathan Anderson’s latest collection strikes a ridiculous note. Combining the presentation of the men’s and women’s collections in one event, “the proudly masculine and the wickedly feminine are united in a kaleidoscopic blur” created of bright hues and metallic flashes. The models, now with elephant-shaped bags, now with pigeons in their hands, reflect a childlike naiveté as they walk through the setting of a deserted nightclub. “Dressing bluntly, colliding with fragments of youth like confetti scattered at a house party.”

Virgil Abloh’s latest collection, the journey into a dreamlike world in which the fashion house pays tribute to the creative director who died last November. Imagining a metaphysical space made of possibilities, the Carreau du Temple in Paris is transformed into the Louis Dreamhouse, a childlike interior of ideas and perspectives that opens up once you cross the threshold of the large Victorian-style mansion. The models parade following a frame of disjointed elements, from the house to simple furnishings, designed to bring the domestic space back to the center of reflection. A sequence of clothes designed as sculptural objects, here butterfly wings or hats with long donkey ears, here the colors of street style. Through materials and techniques, gestures of surrealism take shape, abstracting the familiar and opening up a perspective through the eyes of a child. The collection transmutes clothing codes popularly linked to societal archetypes and stitches them together in new ways.

For the brand, a number of tapestries from Mobilier National serve as a backdrop, undergoing a progressive metamorphosis as they pass on a video wall to the rhythm of the models on the runway. As the exhibition progressed, these digital renderings slowly blurred and abstracted until they resembled a scene from Turner’s Sky. The work of creative director Cyril Teste draws on the “glossy beauty of a corroded technical canvas,” where the clever juxtaposition of contrasting materials composes textile and visual oxymorons, associating smooth and velvety finishes, matte and shiny effects, soft and rustling sensations to the touch. The design of a dandy aesthetic made contemporary.

Lucie and Luke Meier present at the Cathedral of the Holy Trinity in Paris an individualism-proof collection. Accompanied by a soundtrack of Panda Bear and Animal Collective, the new collection becomes a demonstration of elegance and sophistication. Coats with double lapels and jackets are filled with crocheted details, sleeveless wool sweaters and vests with new fabrications, shiny brown and black leather pants and essential black trench coats. The encounter between crochet and tailoring meant that the expressions focused more on impactful pieces than on an overall result. Final touch then the reference to the horoscope, which appears in the form of zodiac signs with minimal graphics printed on scarves, coats, shirts and wool sweaters.