Junichi Abe’s Kolor is a masterful proponent of hybridising garments, mixing jackets and shirts and sweaters into twisty, seemingly complicated cross-breed without ever getting so knotted up the whole thing looks difficult or undesirable. Thats how Kolor has carved out a position on an increasingly crowded menswear calendar (I mean, we’re obis knackered dashing between these shows in Paris right now). There was something a bit fifties well-bred schoolboy accidentally getting his gym kit mixed up with his Sunday school best to this Kolor show – although maybe that was just the spick and span slicker-than-thou hairdos that gave us that impression. According to Mr Abe backstage it was about mixing the sophisticated with something sloppy, so I guess we’re not so wrong – at least, our gym kit was always sloppy. In fact, we’re still pretty sloppy. Maybe that;s why this Kolor collection looked so super. Super sloppy. Sloppily super.
Photographs by Jason Lloyd-Evans
