Following up on last season’s collection, Egonlab has made it clear that they don’t want to be an elitist brand, but really something they want people to have fun with. If the key trend for Spring Summer was Preppy then Egonlab is giving us something of a semester dropout for fall, dropping out to finish a good book or maybe finish an album. If we haven’t been there, at some point we wish we did.

“Parasomnia” marks their 7th collection and we are starting to see more of their vision, fashion/art/rock group Palaye Royale walked the runway giving way to the collection that celebrated individualism. I’ve been thinking a lot recently about another type of fashion, maybe fashion without fashion. What we are seeing isn’t a dictated total look or one strict vision, but one that taps in on today.

People are spending less and collecting more, looking at individual pieces to add to their already existing wardrobes rather than total looks. This is very much the Gen Z ethos, and Egonlab knows this. It’s more about finding those pieces that are missing from your closet whether it’s an extra-long Hogwarts- inspired scarf or a floral glitch print, it’s about the juxtaposition of what you already might have and what you want to explore and add. You might already have oversized faux fur and then will be looking for a fitted pair of jeans by Egonlab, or visa versa. Designing a collection with this in mind may be part of their vision of people having fun with it, but it also shows how they are rethinking how designers need to think if they are going to combat the environmental impacts of consumerism.

When having to define what makes a designer French, it is usually something found in the intertwining of bourgeois and bohemian identities. Florentin Glemarec and Kevin Nompeix understand the intersectionality of vintage and genderless, like they understand that we can’t continue to consume more without looking at what we already have while taking that inspiration and modernizing the look with a slew of romantic blazes, Zoom Suits (business on the top, party on the bottom), attention to expanding denim along with riffing on particular fixtures like flannels, stripped knits and even on deconstruction that is reminiscent of something passed. If things didn’t seem so coherent, it’s because that reflects what we see on the street or at school, a Hodge podge of fashion that is refreshing in the day and age of homogeneity. I asked the stylist sitting next to me what he thought of the collection and he said “it’s Saint Laurent, but rough around the edges.” Which I thought was the best description of that French je ne sais quoi.

Take a look at the collection below: