Gareth Pugh made an about-face from the dramatic, martial mood of his fall 2015 collection – which marked his return to the London schedule – and swapped it for a dose of disco, and hard-edged glamour.
In his show notes, the designer said he’d taken his cues from his show’s Soho location, and the tension between the polished redevelopment of the area and its historic reputation as the hub of London’s nightlife. Or as Pugh put it: “A battle royal between the drag queens and the developers.”
The drag queens were the victors on the runway, awash in sequins, leather, shaggy fur and latex. Models – who looked like Leigh Bowery-esque clowns, with made-up faces painted on to their nylon face masks – stalked out in body-skimming designs that evoked the late Seventies and Eighties. There were bias-cut, one-shouldered dresses in red and white candy stripes; fringed bodysuits worn with red latex tights, and a playsuit with a plunging neckline, done in a chain-mail of coins that Pugh called “lucky pennies.”
While mildly subversive, this collection lacked Pugh’s dark drama, and many of the designs dipped into costume party territory.