The vertical stripes on the suits that Yohji Yamamoto showed in his spring collection looked like a crossover from his work with the Adidas label Y-3, but the designer had a different spin on the theme. “Caution. Stripes. Off-limits,” he said backstage.
Whether that interpretation should be taken literally was moot. Bright yellow strips — reminiscent of safety bands — glared out from a silky black jacket, while pinstripes virtually melded into the fabric of a crinkled suit. The piping detail on some jackets and pants struck a balance between the two extremes.
In wild contrast, Yamamoto played with painterly effects including collage and brushstroke prints. He used a friend’s graphic pen drawings of skeletons — shown performing mundane duties like walking the dog or playing guitar — as prints on black suits and white shirts.
Whatever the core message, the lineup was one of his tightest in recent memory.