Hermès Fall Winter 2021 Looks Through A Multi-Dimensional Lens
Style, Editor's Pick

The Hermès Fall Winter 2021 Collection Looks Through A Multi-Dimensional Lens

  • By Wilson Lim

The Hermès Fall Winter 2021 Collection Looks Through A Multi-Dimensional Lens
Hermès men’s universe artistic director Véronique Nichanian approaches ready-to-wear through a multi-dimensional lens for the Fall Winter 2021 collection.

“Everything that can be invented has already been invented” might have been incorrectly attributed to the commissioner of US patent office, Charles H. Duell in 1889 concerning his department’s future. However, it does not change the fact that it is so frequently referenced in predicting the demise of various industries, and many have come to accept the status quo as a sort of utopia. The lack of desire to innovate and improve can be wanting and may also contribute to the death of businesses.

Hermès men’s universe artistic director, Véronique Nichanian has instead operated in an antithetical direction for the French Maison. In each of her collections, Nichanian has never lost sight of the need to design for the everyday man who seeks to elevate his wardrobe with pieces that stand out with luxurious subtleties instead of boasting about his keen eye for the finer details.

While most would think new inventions need to be extraordinarily advanced, many also fail to realise that even the good can be made better — which seems to be the guiding mantra of Nichanian in her 31-year tenure at Hermès. Her Hermès Fall Winter 2021 collection continues the trajectory of inventing new dimensions of menswear.


The Hermès Fall/Winter ’21 collection’s presentation returns to Nichanian’s recent adoration, the Mobilier National (three out of four of the recent men’s collections have been presented there). She explains, “I am attached to the Mobilier National, which symbolises know-how and the transmission of knowledge, whilst exemplifying creativity. I see Auguste Perret’s minimalist architecture as an expression of masculinity.”

French director, Cyril Teste also returns to present the Hermès Fall/Winter ’21 collection via an audience-free performance entitled “Intérieur / Extérieur / Jour” (French for: Interior / Exterior / Day) that takes inspiration from the space. The performance is presented through six camera views, with which the audience can toggle to focus on interesting sartorial details or take in the mise-en-scène.

The Hermès Fall Winter 2021 Collection Looks Through A Multi-Dimensional Lens
The Hermès Fall Winter 2021 presentation begins at the middle-level of Mobilier National’s grand staircase with an earthy tonal look of a green pea coat, turtleneck sweater and taupe leather jogger pants contrasted with bright yellow sneakers. The starting point was chosen for its geometric spiral and its connotation of a spinal cord, a passageway bathed in light that connects the inside to the outside.

This magnificent structure is a continuous focus of the presentation as models mill around rooms and finally exit to the courtyard of the Mobilier National. The presentation embodied an interest in verticality, — models moving along the spiral staircase in the Mobilier National instead of walking on a flat horizontal runway. The direction involved soft, elegant interactions between models hybridised with nonchalance. Displaying various angles onscreen, the presentation echoed modern transformations of image-viewing on digital media.

As seen from the performance, the messaging of the Hermès Fall/Winter ’21 presentation is a direct one — moving from room to room indoors and finally heading out. The simple act is an encouragement to all of us to reconnect with the movement of the world, which has locked itself inwards and holds the potential to go beyond. The re-established view can be seen in the collection’s colour palette — dark tropes of black, brown and grey (or what Nichanian terms “false blacks”) are interspersed with glimmers of vibrant yellow, light blue and bright red.

The Hermès Fall Winter 2021 Collection Looks Through A Multi-Dimensional Lens
However, Nichanian’s interpretation of movement in her designs of the Hermès Fall/Winter ’21 collection is far more layered. She had intended for them to move beyond strict categorisation and build connections between families of clothing that tend to be separated. In previous collections, Nichanian had thoroughly displayed this notion with tailored, pleated jogger pants and layering suit jackets over cashmere tank-tops. For Fall/Winter ’21, tapered pants are given drawstring waist and the layering of overshirts on shirts with a singular zip replacing buttons continues.

Given Hermès’s savoir faire in material innovation and manipulation, the tearing down of formal categorisation came in the form of shearling jackets mixed with lightweight technical cotton and mohair-blend tweed put together with ribbed cashmere. The material hybridisation also comes through in the bags where House classics of the Haut à courroies luggage and Garden voyage tote bag are reiterated in woolly canvas and calfskin.

Essentially, the blurring of categories gives rise to a hybrid and practical Hermès wardrobe that is at once casual and elegant — luxuriously comfortable to wear at home on one’s couch yet befittingly sumptuous on the office chair.

The Hermès Fall Winter 2021 Collection Looks Through A Multi-Dimensional Lens
The contrasting ideologies of comfort and structure are yet another manifestation of movement in the Hermès Fall Winter 2021 collection. As models mill around the Mobilier National with ease, the structure in the silhouettes never loses its form — the look in a petroleum blue overshirt and mustard-khaki pants take a seat without bunching and looking frumpy.

Nichanian also introduces movement in the still objects of her designs. The non-linear and dispersed placement of patch pockets on jackets and pants give the optical illusion of travelling around the clothes as the wearer moves. She went so far as to up the challenge by designing curved patch pockets as seen on the red shearling jacket with its placement sitting between the collar and the shoulder. Subtle motion can also be seen with trimming pipings on pants and shirts.

The source of energy bursting throughout the Hermès Fall Winter 2021 collection culminates in the overt graphical checks and the Drive Me Crazy print — a trompe-l’oeil of saddlery tools. While Nichanian has tasked herself to look beyond previous approaches to clothing — which saw new customs flourish at a time when lifestyles are changing — she has never lost sight of bringing easy comfort and elevated designs to the wearers. That may be written into the House codes but its practice serves the purpose of staying relevant commercially and for the artistry to continuously thrive. Nichanian’s process unfolds in her various innovations for the Hermès Fall Winter 2021 collection — “I want to believe in a form of optimism and pleasure indistinguishable from the creative spirit; and that is what this collection sets out to show.”

This story about the Hermès Fall Winter 2021 collection first appeared in our September 2021 issue