In the streets of Milan and Paris, women were showing the men how menswear is done
We dub this stretch of January the menswear season – a time when Milan and Paris play host to a hefty calendar of autumn/winter presentations – but the gender demarcation is hardly strict. Women design menswear; women walk the runways, modelling the masculine and epicene; and, over the last few seasons, the definition of androgyny has begun to expand, encompassing not only the idea of women in tailoring, but men in explicitly feminine garb. Hence the ribbons and short-shorts and vertiginous necklines, plunging dangerously close to the navel and beyond; all of it read as permission to practise prettiness.
Women make appearances on the front rows too, which means that the female attendees try their hand at street style. When you’re in a crowd of the fashion-fluent, it’s a hard task standing out. And while there’s no strict formula for success, a handful of elements tie the best looks together. Proportion and colour are given considerations – the art of balancing an oversized piece with something fitted, of coupling complementary shades. But it's experimental quirk and honesty that are, perhaps, the most important ingredients: a touch of the unexpected, and the comfort of the wearer that signals these are pieces that have lived and been loved, outside of being photographed.
Here, we present the best-dressed women we spotted at the menswear autumn/winter ’24 presentations in Milan and Paris.
A guest outside 032c AW24.
A guest outside Issey Miyake AW24.
A guest outside Prada AW24.
A guest outside Lemaire AW24.
A guest outside Amiri AW24.
A guest outside 032c AW24.
A guest outside Issey Miyake AW24.
A guest outside Fendi AW24.
A guest outside Botter AW24.
A guest outside MSGM AW24.
A guest outside 032c AW24 .
Originally published by Vogue Australia.