Projects
| PS by Paul Smith | Paul Smith | Fashion | Florence | 2014 |
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Targeting a younger audience than its older sibling, the brief for the launch of PS by Paul Smith was to devise a kinetic spectacle demonstrating Smith’s ability to create a more casual range for men that addressed their increasingly agile lifestyles whilst demonstrating the functional nature of their designs.
Befitting its sportier take on the house’s mainline DNA for the modern man who merges work with pleasure and requires a wardrobe straddling both spheres, the active and highly stylised runway performance utilised the low-tech elements of spot-lighting to create high drama and physicality. Breaking the mould of traditional presentations with models sauntering down a catwalk single file, multiple spectacles of interest occurred simultaneously. Guests watched models dance, cycle, and perform acrobatics on raised plinths inside a large industrial warehouse lit by flamingo pink strobe lights and projections of the PS monogram upon the floor.
The walls of Paul’s press room were hung salon-style with round convex mirrors. As a playful microscopic design feature, they acknowledged the brand’s new casual ready-to-wear focus whilst their fractured reflections referenced their alignment with the mature label’s retro aesthetic sensibility, yet new divergent path.
Photography by Francesca Anichini