from the chiasmus archive: February 16th, 2022. "A-COLD-WALL. FALL 2022"

Probably one of the quintessential outwear and architecturally inspired designers in the fashion industry at the moment, is Samuel Ross of his own label A-Cold-Wall, which, being only five years old, has been able to deliver an array of seasonal styles distinct to Ross’s vision of the avant-garde. The young designer who was once an intern for the late Virgil Abloh of Off White fame, who passed away this year, Ross has continued to sharpen his streetwear appeal, formulating a uniqueness in representing his urbanism inspired manifesto.

There is doubt that Ross is inspired by a post industrialist world that has broken down and if you are interested in the theory of this concept, I have an article titled “The Simulacrum of Utopian Decay” that asserts the theorem that Utopia is a decayed concept more than not. And it is Ross’s deconstruction aesthetics which hold a resonance, reminding us that we live within its dystopian landscape, as an imprint of a societal obsession with prefabrication.

Ross has been adept with his collections of layering styles, portraying a durable impression, while redefining structure to be that collapsed entity and devising his designs in its renewed creative template. It is the artist and designer that are able to see flaws as possibilities, well aware that nature as a construct wills us to adjust to its indifference, not the other way around. Seen, with the mishandling of the COVID-19 pandemic, that the economic engines came first over adjusting to a natural occurrence that has been with humanity since our primordial ancestors evolved from the mud. Viruses and calamity will continue to occur ad infinitum, which in turn, inevitably, changes our society. An economic precedence should be secondary to our survival. Why not have urban aesthetics to reflect the fact? If humanity is to defy nature, we must learn to meld into the natural world without destroying it, as we will ultimately, before our time, when the Earth will be obliterated by the Sun, eradicate ourselves.

Ross’s use of the material polaymide is evident throughout his latest collection, with its crisp construction influenced cladding, cropped bomber jackets, boxy coats and jumpers. The color palette runs mostly as a gray base, with its austere stylizations and unfinished pattern work, ala half finished buildings and abandoned work sites. But it is, as mentioned, the wearable durability, that keeps Ross’s arrays practicable despite its futurist and modernist styles. Although there is a postmodernist impression that A-Cold-Wall offers, the constructive looks with its dismantled cities as a backdrop, assist in setting down Ross’s urban configurations within an urbanized and riven world.

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(A.Glass 2022)