Wales Bonner Menswear S/S 2024 Paris

[vogue28]

VOGUE.COM

 

[Salvatore]

Looks elevated and good !

 

[Cocteau Stone]

Should have been Grace taking over LV men's. Not just for her skill, but imagine what else she could do there and with her own label too with the added financing.

Fantastic collision with the sportswear as well. In similar vein to early Xuly Bët and I'm not mad at it.

 

[Norden]

Ah I love this, like Lemaire she has a very clear perspective and it comes through. Its small evolutions each collections, which I can appreciate. Its a very humble line.

 

[Phuel]

The men’s suiting is gorgeous. The cuffed sleeve with the button holes; the satin-trimmed upturn hem and waistline; the leopard-print in 4K HD are all such sly, sleek and sensual flourishes that whisper and never scream. Shame there aren't more. Could have done without the gym clothes alongside too many women’s looks, but just to see Lineisy looking like a throwback Bgirl makes it acceptable.

Should have been Grace taking over LV men's.

She’s way too good to for Vuitton men, which has become this permanent figurehead for crass, garish, juvenile over-glorified streetwear. Whatever obnoxiously loud, insufferably gaudy Dapper Dan ripoff Pharrell served up over there is the equivalent of a corporate, soulless, over-budget excess of a pop tart's Super Bowl halftime show, while Grace’s effortless dressing is the warm, honey-toned sensuality of bygone-era chanteuse.

 

[Kennnnn]

I love how she keeps building on and refining her signatures from season to season. I think it would have been more effective if she hadn't included the Adidas and Ugg pieces, but this is just a minor criticism. The womenswear is also very good. (She should take over Chloé.)

 

[Lola701]

Everybody seems to love her work and I’m feeling weird because I don’t see it. There’s something in the cut and in the elegant way she presents what she does but something is not working…
Maybe it’s the Adidas thing in a way. It kinda pollute her message every season.

I’m trying to see her like a kind of Bouchra Jarrar with a little bit more fantasy.

I don’t want her at the helm of a big brand or even a smaller brand like Rochas because there’s a financial pressure that her type of proposition in fashion wouldn’t support.

She could have been good for Bally for example. She needs a side job that will allow her to fulfill her total vision at her own brand.

 

[susseinmcswanny]

I feel the same way Lola I just don't see it. The way I interpret it is like elevated dump pile? Which isn't a bad thing and could be interesting but it just comes across as extremely mid and doesn't grab me in any way.

 

[Phuel]

^^^Elevated dump pile LOL

I’ve mentioned this before, and what frustrates me about her is that her collections never feels and looks complete. Whether that is because she is someone of such a spare and minimal statement and frankly, of limited creative vision, or her budget just won’t allow it. But a few more suits and coats/jackets, and a few showpiece spurges would really transcend and elevate her spare and plain offering to a more designer’s refined vision. (If she insists on always showing those damn retro gym clothes that look like they're snatched from Urban Outfitters circa2008, a solid coat draped over them would do wonders for the visuals.)

She is a talented dressmaker and tailor at heart, and maybe that’s what she’s comfortable with presenting, so anything too showy, ostentatious isn’t true to her spirit. And in these days of such excessive mediocrity, I’m more than happy with her sparse offering.

 

[lhhbl]

Everybody seems to love her work and I’m feeling weird because I don’t see it. There’s something in the cut and in the elegant way she presents what she does but something is not working…
Maybe it’s the Adidas thing in a way. It kinda pollute her message every season.

I’m trying to see her like a kind of Bouchra Jarrar with a little bit more fantasy.

I don’t want her at the helm of a big brand or even a smaller brand like Rochas because there’s a financial pressure that her type of proposition in fashion wouldn’t support.

She could have been good for Bally for example. She needs a side job that will allow her to fulfill her total vision at her own brand.

agreed. I dont really get the hype. but I always see her shows because everyone seems to love and I wait to feel anything but I don't. everything seems kinda normal. kuddos for the casting tho. always good.

 

[mepps]

I think she's awful, and I always have.
The praise she gets for her menswear is so weird to me, because no man looks good in her clothes, not even her models.
People like to heap all of this intellectual nonsense on what she does, when it's all just tacky.

 

[LANZO_358]

I think she's awful, and I always have.
The praise she gets for her menswear is so weird to me, because no man looks good in her clothes, not even her models.
People like to heap all of this intellectual nonsense on what she does, when it's all just tacky.

I wouldn’t go as far as to say “awful” but I can see the “intellectual nonsense” as a valid critique, especially if one isn’t from the culture/s that she references so often. But I can think of far worse and overhyped brands *cough cough Bode*

Personally, I see WB as a romantic designer in the same way Demeulemeester and others like her gets bandied about. The difference, however, is that Bonner’s has a Black face (not blackface hahaha). I see it as a love letter and treatise on a post-colonial, newly independent diasporic Black commonwealth. Plus, the fact she constantly references places like Jamaica, and people like Bob Marley, Haile Selassie, and groups like the Rastafarians, coupled with her beautiful fashion films, prove to me she’s invested and it’s not just drivel.

Her pieces are ceremonial as they are sturdy. I have a pair of pleated, high-waisted, blue selvedge jeans with gold buttons by her that garners compliments every time I wear it.
Unlike EABA, she’s not simply upcycling tea cloths and turning them into shirts with questionable sizing.

This collection, I’ll admit, is quite thin in terms of ideas when compared to her others. But, I do love the proposition of silver as a neutral for day. (We saw a lot of that in Paris last winter with many variations of silver footwear, from trainers to boots, to loafers). The blue doily shorts (look 28) are lovely also and as mentioned elsewhere in the thread I too love the men’s suiting (look 19, especially). They’d pair great with the recently released silver Samba that are so hard to find now or something from Dries or even Lemaire.

Anyhoo. Walk good.

 

[youthinasia]

agreed. I dont really get the hype. but I always see her shows because everyone seems to love and I wait to feel anything but I don't. everything seems kinda normal. kuddos for the casting tho. always good.

I too agree. While I don't deny her talent and tailoring, there seems to be something missing. The addition of the adidas pieces kind of ruins the fantasy.

 

[disco54]

Over rated and awful , she is just a smidgen better than Gabriela Hearst

 

[yslforever]

Over rated and awful , she is just a smidgen better than Gabriela Hearst

Which is not difficult.

 

[Phuel]

Are industry movers/shakers overrating/hyping her??? She was featured in Vogue some time ago— or maybe Bazaar, one of the mainstream rags, and that’s all I can remember of any feature— unlike that Kim Jones plague, who LVMH has propagated as some king of the dipsh!ts and forced his gormless mug in every Vogue rag to no end.

She’s more admirable for simply plugging away, doing her own thing of an always reliable palette of well-made, well-tailored easygoing wardrobe staples, with her distinctive flourishes. Frankly, a show is so unnecessary for her sensibility. And she’s not relying on some noble image of the Black designer raging against the machine to stake her claim in the industry. Hype is/was what someone like Kerby relied on at the height of the pro-Black frenzy when he showed his pathetic and hilarious attempt at HC with his kindergarten Black History Month costumes LOL And the LVMH hype machine will inevitably be in full force for Pharrell’s display of excess consumerism (a post in the Vuitton thread already anointed him as the “architect” of streetwear LOL). While they have/will rely on identity politics to hustle their merch, Grace has simply been always inspired by her roots— along with one that’s deeply seeded in disciplined tailoring and dressmaking. That she isn’t this showcase of excess, ostentatious and gaudy cultural trappings but rather a modest, and understated to the point of plaintive is admittedly what is likely her weakest point, but what I find endearing and personable of her design and of her aura. She’s not that different from a label like Margaret Howell (but so much better with her details). Again, her offerings always is the equivalen of blue balls to me, but who buys an entire collection anyway? A suit, a coat, a jacket and maybe that silver Adidas track jacket with the matching cummerbund would be more than enough.

 

[Kennnnn]

While they have/will rely on identity politics to hustle their merch, Grace has simply been always inspired by her roots— along with one that’s deeply seeded in disciplined tailoring and dressmaking. That she isn’t this showcase of excess, ostentatious and gaudy cultural trappings but rather a modest, and understated to the point of plaintive is admittedly what is likely her weakest point, but what I find endearing and personable of her design and of her aura.

100% agree. I think that part of her appeal is her authenticity, and how she parlays that into her clothing.