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February 26, 2025
If, as most individuals consider, the designers of Jil Sander, Luke and Lucie Meier are about to get replaced, they actually have left Germany’s most well-known vogue label on a excessive notice.
Picture Credit: Godfrey Deeny
A daring mix of sharp tailoring, punchy results, uncommon materials mixes, and concrete stylish was an admirable remaining assortment of their tenure at Jil Sander, a home based in Hamburg in 1973. Staged in funeral black, with two slender runways beneath black-curtained partitions, in dim undertaker’s mild, the temper and the gathering have been somber as one entered from a sunny Wednesday morning at Milan Trend Week.
That stated, the garments typically dazzled, from pink shard attire to metallic silver plissé cocktails. The design duo’s huge concept was plastic shard skirt attire—minimize like techy Pacific Island stylish.
Picture Credit: Godfrey Deeny
In a co-ed present, the fellows appeared in Edwardian coats and blazers bristling with cock feathers and biker leather-based fits in electrical blue, whereas a sequence of coats for women and men featured ingenious degradé coloring, starting in black and fading into bronze, then white at their excessive funnel necks.
Picture Credit: Godfrey Deeny
Contemplating that Jil Sander was as soon as dubbed “the Queen of Less,” this felt like a really distant “More is More”—particularly the footwear: hyper-studded and spiked winklepickers and brothel creepers. There was nothing minimal about them. In reality, the home of Jil Sander has had an erratic historical past because the founder departed in 2004 after repeated clashes with then-owner Patrizio Bertelli of Prada. Possession modified fingers a number of instances, together with to a vulture fund, earlier than being acquired by OTB and its chairman, Renzo Rosso, the Italian billionaire founding father of Diesel, in 2021. Nevertheless, for a number of seasons now, Renzo Rosso has been overtly expressing his want to make Jil Sander into an Italian Hermès with an edge. This assortment was removed from that. Certainly, if one may fault Luke and Lucie Meier for something, it was that the gathering, with its sharp traces and exaggerated finishes, felt extra focused at critics than shoppers. Three weeks in the past, Rosso named Serge Brunschwig from Fendi as Jil Sander’s new CEO, underlining that change is on the best way.
That stated, the Meiers can go away Jil Sander with their heads held excessive, even when they took an extended, reasonably mournful tour of the catwalk to some well-earned applause. Their seven-year tenure featured a number of wonderful collections that have been among the many half-dozen greatest in vogue in sure seasons—no straightforward feat to attain, relaxation assured.
For the longer term, the present favourite to exchange them at Jil Sander is Daniel Lee of Burberry. Keep tuned because the profession carousel that top vogue has turn out to be takes one other flip.
