June 15, 2025 |
One thing guaranteed from a Martine Rose show is a shed-load of community spirit. It’s never been a one-woman show for Rose, who has routinely used her catwalk shows (many now the stuff of legend) to spotlight the work of her ongoing collaborators, uplift her local heroes and celebrate those who live life on the fringes in blazing glory.
For her first London show in two years – Rose had decamped to Milan and Paris, showing a lookbook last season – her return to home soil landed the fash pack in a disused job centre in Marylebone. Inside she set up a market, inviting 22 independent makers, traders, designers and musicians to flog their merch. From queer publishers Smut Press and PARC London, S&M tee brand LadyCotton and the brilliantly bonkers designs of Pig Ignorant, Jonty K Mellmann and 4FSB, “it was an opportunity to celebrate all the creative people in London and everyone that contributes to the cultural life [of the city],” said Rose.
She had turned the floor above into her own version of a couture salon, draping the banal space in silky white curtains. The overhead office lighting and shutter blinds brought the transportive space back down to reality; Rose has always found ways to exaggerate the mundane into something rather spectacular. The same could be said for the clothes on display. Rose, one of the first to take menswear to oversized realms, proposed a new shrunken silhouette. Parkas, Harrington and leather jackets were suctioned close to the body – “everything feels too tight, slightly awkward but somehow still sexy,” says Rose.
As with all things Martine, there was something kinky about the whole thing. Slacks came fused with footie socks, frayed daisy dukes were belted with cock ring-like buckles and Nike trainers were elongated into sleazy winkle pickers.
Rose joked after the show that it was her own version of the shapewear that dominates fashion today, unleashing trackie bottoms in drainpipe proportions and leather trousers with motocross knee pants that looked as if they were moulded to the models’ legs. She was also thinking of the traders who are at the heart of high streets across the city, cutting ponchos to resemble barber shop capes and envisioning transparent, frilly apron skirts in homage to all those who keep inner city life moving.
The designer’s street-casted troupe had shaggy manes and granny curls as they flaunted lady-like bags draped in Martine tees, all to the crowd’s delight who cheered and whistled throughout. The show was a vision of London in all its beautiful chaos and all the characters who light its spark. Never change Martine, never change London.
Photography courtesy of Martine Rose.
