Menswear Fall 2012

Menswear Style Report Fall 2012 Keeping up with each show at New York, London, Milan and Paris Fashion Week, meant that irregular eating and sleeping patterns were the price in which I had to pay. In the end though it was all worth it. Fashion Month gave us endless hours of excitement, fab street style and of course – trends for this coming Autumn/Winter from the top designers in the business. Fashion bloggers and insiders from the industry kept us all up to date through twitter and various other social media, and gave us reports on which trends stood out at each show. What they didn't give us however, were trend reports on menswear collections that read longer than a single, solitary paragraph. If I were a guy, I would be pretty peeved, so I decided to give the guys what they've been waiting for; A style report on the top trends this coming season. New York was first up, where we saw menswear collections from designers such as DKNY, Duckie Brown, John Bartlett, Rag & Bone, Tommy Hilfiger, Antonio Azzuolo and Robert Geller. DKNY (seen to the right was the one show which I found to contain a lot of the recurring trends from NYFW all rolled into one; Sleek evening/business wear in the form of black and gray double breasted trouser suits were finished with shades to give a casual-cool edge to the look. Day wear followed with horizontal stripe and patterned jumpers, slouchy knit cardigans, checked shirts, stone coloured chinos - which had the legs rolled up slightly - and jackets with shearling collars and lining. Then came a series of looks that would have best suit a get away driver; baseball caps, black leather gloves, bomber-style jackets, padded body warmers and jackets, leather shirts and shirt jackets, turtle-neck tops and wool blend jackets all worked together to create some very stylish - yet warm for our Scottish weather - autumn/winter looks.
Up next was London and for this particular fashion week, we saw menswear collections from the likes of Belstaff, Ozwald Boateng, MAN, Christopher Shannon, Topman Design, Matthew Miller and RAKE to name but a few. Topman Design in particular showed it's gothic side for Autumn/Winter 2012; Leather trousers featured heavily with fur and wool long line coats to fend off the chill of a UK winter. Long knit cardigans and double breasted blazers and jackets were a trend which carried over from the previous week in New York alongside belted waists and black leather gloves. Shirts were either black, gray or white, with some featuring full on patterns in the form of polka dots and various other geometric prints. The color palette used as a whole? Black with a few sporadic flashes of white and gray. It's week three and we find ourselves in Milan. The home of the most glamorous and famous fashion designers in the business; Gucci, Fendi and Prada – You know you're going to see some amazing shows when you hear those names. For menswear, that means shows from Alexander McQueen, Prada, Bally, Versace, Botega Veneta, Dsquared2, Burberry Prorsum, Calvin Klein, Gucci, D&G, Emporio Armani...and the list goes on. From the grand opulence and grandeur at D&G, to the in your face, electric color combinations at Versace; Milan had something for every type of man this Autumn/Winter. Florals, checks, tailored suiting and intricate brocade featured at many of the menswear shows such as Alexander McQueen (seen to the left) and D&G, with double breasted suits (sensing the trend here?), pinstripes, polka dots, gun prints, leather gloves, trousers and jackets at Valentino, Prada and Gucci. Missoni was the one show which had a focus on 'outdoorsy festival' day wear with preppy knit cardigans, scarf’s and double breasted suits which went alongside striped, geometric print tops and jumpers, puffa jackets, gilets and duffle jackets. Not only will you guys love the looks, but there were a few cardigans and jackets in there that I'm sure the females in your life would no doubt want to cover up in too!
If you liked what Milan had to offer, wait until you see what Paris turned out. Balmain, 3.1 Phillip Lim, Acne, Christian Lacroix Homme, Lanvin, YSL, Givenchy, Hermes, Issey Miyake, Louis Vuitton, Jean Paul Gaultier and Karl Lagerfeld Paris were among the shows which contributed towards a great ending to a fashion-filled month. Velvet, knitwear and leather played a large part in the majority of collections this week, however one collection which featured all three in an interesting way was Balmain (seen below), which had a theme of Russian Imperial Army meets classic Rock n' Roll.
Skinny jeans in red, white, navy, black and denim were paired with rolled neck tops, knit cardigans and double breasted military style blazers (some in velvet) with shoulder pad detailing, finished off with clompy buckled leather boots. On paper it would have seemed out of sorts for Balmain, however it merged seamlessly when seen in the flesh. Olivier Rousteing done a fine job with this collection considering it is only his second for Balmain menswear.  Finally, to summarise all four fashion weeks, the top five key trends for Menswear Autumn/Winter 2012 are;

1. Double Breasted Jackets/Coats & Blazers in Grey, Black, Navy, Red & Deep Purple.
2. Checks, Stripes, Geometric Shapes and Pinstripes.
3. Leather gloves and...well, everything really.
4. Turtle-necks
5. Fur & Shearling Lined/Trimmed Coats