Should fashion be more meaningful? Every few decades the question gets asked, and as we move into the 21st century's teen years, it has rolled around again, thanks to a pair of surprising collaborations.
After the Aesthetic Dress movement of the 19th century; after the love affair between fashion and art (Schiaparelli and the Dadaists; Nicole Farhi and sculptor Benedetta Mori-Ubaldini, whose wire animals are currently showcased in the designer's London shop windows); after a flirtation between style and literature (Zandra Rhodes and Celia Birtwell have designed book covers for Penguin and White's Books' edition of Wuthering Heights respectively) comes ... fashion and philosophy.
A new shirt collection launched by Bruce Montgomery, design director of men's wear label Alexander Boyd, for example, is entitled “Poetic Summer” and aims to make fashion “a little bit more intellectual”. Avoiding the rather existential question of whether this is, in fact, an impossible task, Montgomery has designed shirts, each of which is inspired by a poet: Keats, Blake, Byron, Milton, Burns and so on.