Yohji Yamamoto men’s Fall 2018 – Paris Fashion Week

(Images from wwd.com the public domain. All rights.  Used in promotion of the designer.)

Yohji Yamamoto as a master designer, knows that a master is not actually a master.  But a beginner who is always learning.  As the great Sōtō Zen monk Shunryu Suzuki  once said “In the beginner’s mind there are many possibilities, but in the expert’s there are few.”  This is an important lesson, that you don’t essentially master a craft, you always lean to attain the mastery, to start anew, not to assume a disposition of superiority.  Are you great after ten years of practice?  What about today?  Did you gain or loose?  The one that completes a task and then walks away is the true master.

Yohji Yamamoto’s Fall 2018 collection is stunning in its presentation.  An emotionally driven and sincere array of a starkness, sadness and longing for attainment.  Yamamoto is one of the most outstanding and relevant fashion designers in history.  A powerhouse, who devised the achromatic duality of the Avant-garde, that, essentially would not exist in its form today it was not for Yamamoto.  The two dark and light opposites from the Greek Pythagorean table, more akin to Chinese Confucius philosophy rather than Japanese Zen teachings, which does not see duality in its fixture.  The austere projection of  black and white as a direct fashion statement via Yamamoto which was first revealed on the 1982-1984 runways of Paris and New York.  For this new collection there is more of a sombre appeal, with the models makeup being one of the more distinct characteristics.  Dark sunken eye shadow, as though they are the living dead.  Or spectres of the past, memories, ghosts.

As discussed in my previous show reviews of Fall 2018 and the end of 2017.  The blazer and traditional cut long coats are becoming one of the main trends of 2018.   This is not an unusual  presentation of style from Yohji Yamaoto’s distinguished past as a designer.  But, a refinement within its styling which has become more precise, as you would expect from the mastery that is Yamamoto.  The neutrality of dark and light gray,  fine wool blends from Avant-garde styled blazers and coats, draped and layered, but refined.  Not heavily weighed down.   Simple, yet complex styling, mixed with elements of the risqué, which would be the sheer mesh tops.  A feminine touch, inter-fused with masculine zeal.  One that may have less to do with male/female dualism, but rather taking aspects of the feminine styles and claiming them as a male array.  Rarely, if at all attainable in fashion.  The androgynous, as discussed many times with my fashion reviews, does not resonate within the masculine, it is truly only a female perspective.   In which Yamamoto may only be dabbling in, as the shirt and blazer of this collection (also note the leather distressed pattern sleeves on some of the pieces) are distantly male in its prominence.

Yohji Yamamoto’s Fall 2018 color palette, as mentioned, holds mostly dark and light grays (with some striking Shibori tie dye styles), the stalwart of black and white, with screen printed greens.   Clearly what stands out is the rich Shojyo-hi, a Japanese crimson red with ghostly motifs of a female face on the jackets and long coats.

A necromantic and mysteriously styled collection with all its metaphor from both Eastern and Western symbolism.