The fashion collabs to shop now (if you could get your hands on them)
From Dior x Birkenstock to Adidas x Gucci—there’s no sticker shock as fashion fans rush to snap up the limited collections
Fashion fans are agog at some of the year’s more exciting collaborations that are dropping their collections this month.
The second installment of Manolo Blahnik’s collection for Birkenstock dropped online June 23, just as Dior rolled out in stores, including Manila, its own men’s capsule collection in partnership with the German footwear brand.
Over the weekend, Gucci in Greenbelt released its limited collection with Adidas to its VICs—that’s very important customers to you—and also this week, the Italian luxury house announced another capsule collection: that with British pop star Harry Styles.
Nike, which is celebrating its 50th year, is releasing its shoes and ready-to-wear collection with cult fashion brand Jacquemus, while Lacoste also just rolled out its collection with the understated French ready-to-wear brand A.P.C.
Luxe Birkenstocks
Given how Manolo Blahnik’s first Birkenstock collection in March quickly sold out, it won’t be a stretch to imagine the same happening with the second drop.
The brand synonymous with stilettos teased four variants on social media for the new collection, two of which feature a Blahnik signature—polka dots— on the Birkenstock Boston (clog) style and a new style called Rodra, reminiscent of the crossstrapped Siena model.
Blahnik ditches the velvet and crystals from the first installment, favoring this time poolside-friendly PVC for two Arizona models.
The first installment styles sold for around $750 to $810 a pair on the Birkenstock website (and more at popular online stockists), while the black Boston clog still sells at 460 euros on the Manolo Blahnik website.
A quick check with Dior Manila and we learned that the Dior x Birkenstock men’s collection, the French luxury house’s first tie-up with the German brand, is fast running out—no sticker shock around here evidently. (A pair retails for P68,000.) Given its unisex styling, women are likely to be lining up for them as well— that’s if they could find a size.
The Dior x Birkenstock collection has five variations: two Tokio mules and three Milano sandals, using felted wool and nubuck calfskin on Birkenstock’s signature cork soles. The outsoles bear the imprint of the Dior Oblique and Birkenstock Bones motifs, with Dior-branded adjustable buckles.
A floral appliquéd and hand-embroidered Tokio model was also seen on the runway, but is not available in Manila.
High street meets high fashion
High street and high fashion meet as sportswear giant Adidas and Gucci meld their respective iconographies—trefoil and three stripes for the former, and interlocking G, Horsebit, Web and GG monogram for the latter— in their tie-up that consists of ready-to-wear, handbags, shoes and accessories for both men and women.
Picture the classic Adidas Gazelle but embossed with “Gucci” next to the trefoil—a luxury stamp that brings a pair closer to P50,000 versus a regular Gazelle at way below P5,000. Customers don’t seem to mind, as a second installment is coming to the Manila store, after VICs snapped up the first drop.
“Friendship, complicity, a unification of distinct creativities that meet along a shared border, exchanges and contaminations of collective ideas. And the construction of the absolute pragmatism of bridges that form to connect different perspectives,” begins the press statement on the Gucci collab with pop idol Styles.
“Gucci HA HA HA is not only a printed motif on a label, but the beginning of a jargon that has yet to be categorized and that defines the intersection of creative expression and shared perceptions of two different consciences: This is why it is a collection born from a creative relationship that self-generates from amusement and ends with the tangibility of a product.”
Styles is the same celebrity who has, for years, been the walking avatar of Gucci creative director Alessandro Michele’s aesthetic. That much is clear. As for the press statement—well, Gucci has a peculiar practice of putting out head-scratcher marketing messages (and we’ve seen quite a bit through the years) on an otherwise straightforward idea.
In this case, the creative relationship between designer and his muse, where Michele describes creating the “dream wardrobe” for his musician friend. Playful, childlike
motifs appear on tailored suits and eccentric prints on accessories. Luckily for us, the fashion is far easier to understand.
(By the way, HA HA HA stands for the first-name initials of Michele and Styles; its lower-case version is a stand-in for the laughing emoji, to describe the duo’s friendship.)
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On June 28, the young French label beloved by everyone from Dua Lipa to Bella Hadid, will drop two versions of the Nike Air ACG Humara sneakers, a vintage model that designer Simon Porte Jacquemus has said were his favorite Nike shoes. The designer also teased apparel in muted tones on Instagram. These, however, will be sold exclusively on jacquemus.com.
More accessible, at least locationwise, is the A.P.C. collection for Lacoste, a few styles of which are now available at Lacoste boutiques and lacoste.com.ph.
It consists of polo shirts, jeans, shirts, parkas, dresses, tracksuits, sneakers and accessories bearing playful takes on the alligator logo melded with the A.P.C. stamp. They’re priced from P5,250 for the tote bag to P15,950 for the leather sneakers, P12,950 for the sweatshirts and from P7,950 for the polos.