Power Play with Latimmier
Despite being centred around gratuitous greed, Latimer’s pieces, as always, were consciously designed.Latimmier, Monday 7. August 2023 at 17.00, Finland Room at the Radisson Blu Hotel
The foyer at Copenhagen’s Radisson Blu Scandinavia Hotel is a grandiose space – think Art Deco lighting, a graphic circular rug and structural pillars demarcated by gold trimming. On screens dotted around the entrance, showgoers were notified that Latimmier’s fourth and final collection with CPHFW NEWTALENT, Positions of Power, would take place in the meeting room upstairs.
In a carpeted room with curtain-lined walls in a mottled grey, guests were shown to their seats – each place card doubled as a bank statement from Nordea. Peggy Lee’s Big Spender came blaring out over the speakers, as head designer Ervin Latimer entertained the crowd dressed as their drag alter-ego, Anaconda. In a dishevelled blonde wig, Jackie O-style sunnies, red lipstick and a lace body paired with suspenders, Anaconda completed their opening number: setting the stage for Latimer’s latest exploration of the performance of masculinities.
The soundtrack transitioned into Mark Hanna’s (Matthew McConaughey) famous improvised chant from The Wolf of Wall Street. The film played an integral role in Latimer’s vision for this season, alongside The Guardian article “30 under 30-year sentences: why so many of Forbes’ young heroes face jail”. Essentially, Latimer was preoccupied with exploring archetypical displays of men in power throughout American popular culture. Shrewd attendees noticed that soundbites from character Kendall Roy, of much-hyped TV series Succession, were intermixed with Black Strobe’s I’m a Man.
Models stepped out in suit jackets with fabric wrapped across their torsos, arms strapped to their sides to perhaps signify the restrictive nature of business life. High-waisted pants and deconstructed shirts were shredded on one side, visually echoing the sentiment of falling apart at the seams –– arguably, Latimer’s interpretation of the high-pressure, temperamental nature of the corporate world. Elsewhere, the designer’s own invoices from debt collection agencies were reconfigured into a print that covered asymmetric button-up jackets. T-shirts emblazoned with the words “Money, Power, Glory”, and long-sleeved knits featuring flame motifs, acted as direct depictions of the relentless drive associated with the climb to the top of the corporate ladder.
Despite this collection being centred around gratuitous greed, Latimer’s pieces, as always, were consciously designed. Latimer incorporated 100% recycled materials from the Spanish fabric mill Coleo. Additionally, disfigured bottle caps fashioned into necklaces were the product of a collaboration with the all-female jewellery brand AIDA Impact. Offering a responsible take on corporate reality, Latimer said that this collection riffs on the line “Sell me this pen”: the final utterance of The Wolf of Wall Street’s protagonist, Jordan Belfort. In this instance, the designer managed to sell his audience a sartorial fantasy: one where masculine power dressing is fun, fair and freeing.
See a selection of the show looks below and see the entire collection here.
