Spencer Badu does not seem particularly interested in the idea of menswear behaving itself. Collection 018 takes the familiar language of tailoring and puts it into conversation with sportswear, knitwear, military references and the visual codes of the street, without forcing any of them to surrender their identity. Documented in London, the Fall 2026 collection follows Ottawa Kwami and Rasharn Powell through the city as they move between different environments and states of dress. The result feels less like a prescribed wardrobe than a wardrobe in motion — one that understands that getting dressed is rarely a linear process.

The collection’s tailoring is where that attitude becomes most apparent. A wool officer’s coat arrives with buttons running down the back seam, a small but effective disruption to an otherwise familiar silhouette. A silver cowrie brooch adds another layer, somewhere between jewellery, talisman and insignia. The Post-Work Tailoring proposition continues with a refined stand-collar field jacket and straight-leg chinos in black and khaki, both carrying the signature double waist detail. There is discipline here, but never stiffness.

References become more fluid elsewhere. An ivory striped knit introduces a warmer register, while colour-blocked fleece zip tops and anoraks twist the raglan construction into silhouettes that recall Ghanaian cloth draped over the shoulder. The collection does not treat cultural reference as decoration; it folds it into the way the garments are constructed and worn. A padded nylon vest scattered with custom pins and the maroon-and-black Scattered Button Cardigan further loosen the boundaries between polished and practical.

Even the most recognisable motifs are treated as material for reinterpretation. The red, gold and green triptych returns as a distinctive knit that can be worn over the shoulders or wrapped around the neck, while a full-zip hoodie introduces an asymmetrical button closure and a reworked varsity graphic. The logic is unmistakably that of the remix: take something familiar, change its context and see what happens. It is a sensibility deeply connected to hip hop, where influence has never meant imitation and repetition is often the beginning of invention.

London gives the collection an appropriate setting because the city has always been particularly good at collapsing distinctions between formal and informal dress. But the campaign’s most compelling decision is to make its protagonists active participants in the image-making process. Primarily shot as self-portraits, the photographs featuring Kwami and Powell extend Badu’s interest in identity as something constructed, tested and continually revised. Collection 018 ultimately proposes no definitive way to dress, and that is its strength. It offers the ingredients, then leaves the final edit to the person wearing them.

Have a look at Collection 018, now available at Spencer Badu: