Dior Men’s Fall Winter 2022-2023 campaign goes archival for a novel exploration of French fashion and the poetic expression of Parisian romance.
Dior is not a house to move forward without celebrating its past. Since Kim Jones’s tenure at Dior Men in 2018, there has not been a single show where there hasn’t been a shoutout to Christian Dior’s “New Look”, which takes centre stage in this show, or things like his love of Trianon grey and gardens of roses. A lot of his contributions to fashion today remain hidden in plain sight, so it is a wonderful thing for Jones to pull them out from the dark, spell them out, and do an interpretation of the gifts he has given to the modern fashion lexicon.
While it is understandable to assume that icons and small details are what has been amiss, a big part rarely divulged in the same generous amount is his love for Paris. Or rather, the love for fashion that was conceived in Dior’s birthplace, its romance and frivolous dare to contend conventions are pivotal reasons why Christian Dior saw eye-to-eye with this French city.
A lot of his proclamations of love were more gestural than physical, yet it was his insistence to set up his temple of couture at 30 Avenue Montaigne that his revolutionary silhouettes got where it needed to be today.
To sound this part of the story out louder and clearer, Jones took to the streets of Paris to pay homage to what had inspired Monsieur Dior for the Fall Winter 2022-2023 collection; from his symbols of destiny, cane work (from the back of Monsieur Dior’s neo-Louis XVI medallion armchair), the leopard print (inspired by his friend and muse Mizza Brircard) to the very structures of the streets, his presence was lauded through the street-savvy lens of contemporary menswear.
Shot in a similar vein, the campaign had image-maker Rafael Pavarotti drape highly-saturated and yellow-to-blue ombré images of the Alexandre-III bridge in the background, as nostalgic as in the show.
In this conversation between the formal and informal, tailored marvels are situated with sportswear, the Bar jacket elongated into coats above comfortable sweats. The Dior cannage is also seen on patent leather and woollen hide jackets, the former strategically defined by the surface’s play with light.
As for the bags and accessories, the formal and informal duality ensures. The embroidered Saddle is doubly-used as a bouquet holder, a cheeky reminder of the Monsieur’s obsession with gardening, but the new Dior Corolle tote bag and the Dior x Birkenstock sandals rekindle the utilitarian sensibility that grounds the past decades of Dior Men collections in elegance.
To finish off, the berets celebrate the 25th anniversary of the house’s collaboration with milliner Stephen Jones, first invited to the Maison by John Galliano in 1996, but also circle back to the importance of time and space — the ever dreamy and beautiful Paris.
Discover the rest of the Dior Fall Winter 2022-2023 collection here. Or, click here to catch up with our September 2022 issue.
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