The Maison Martin Margiela Archive + the H&M Touch (& Pricepoint). Oh. My. God.

October 24, 2012

Margiela has long been a fashion-insider fave specializing in daring draping, unusual cuts and tricky silhouettes - sometimes to the point of being a tad impossible for those of us with regular day jobs to pull off. But the designs are always, always interesting and often quite clever. Like this most-excellent collaboration with a cool premise: to re-issue Margiela's most iconic pieces & accessories spanning the 23 years the maison has been in business. Along with updates to both the shapes and the fabrics used, the womenswear gets some snazzy menswear tailoring, while the fellas get treated to some of the frippery usually reserved for their fashionista sistahs.

And both sexes get some thoughtfulness woven into their threads. The concept of "Ambiguity" is conveyed with Trompe l'Oeil designs while "Transformation" means multiple garments fused into one - and all in Margiela'esque shades of white, black, red, silver & nude.

H&M deserves major kudos for avoiding any temptation to dilute Margiela's designs. "The pieces are incredibly accurate to the original and prove how the most radical concept can result in fashion that is both desirable and wearable," explains Margareta van den Bosch, creative advisor to H&M. "With these Maison Martin Margiela re-editions, some of the most important garments in recent fashion history will be made available at H&M."