Models wearing oversized leather vests, long flowy and ruffled dresses, oversized hoodies and bedazzled varsity jackets walked around a post-apocalyptic playground at Coach’s S/S 19 presentation during NYFW. If the music hadn’t been heavy metal, one could have mistaken the vibe for Coachella (the only thing missing were the feather headdresses appropriated by white girls running around in cut off jeans with a full face of contouring.)
Despite the association to the festival that has long been deemed over by the cool kids of NYC, the collection was actually iconically American; just like the brand itself. The several patchwork denim and shearling items were actually amazing (although one could argue that they weren’t particularly spring—but the desert does get cold at night, right?) and so were the fitted leather pants matched with stretched Disney-themed pictorial sweaters that were glittering under the 'foggy' light in the space.
Turns out the inspiration was as close to Coachella or Burning Man as it comes: Coach’s creative director Stuart Vevers had visited the famous Ghost Ranch, famous for it’s Georgia O’Keeffe paintings and many fossils, in Santa Fe before designing the collection.
Coach might be lacking its coolness factor, but unlike Raf Simons at Calvin Klein, Vevers' collections don’t come across as a foreigner's interpretation of American culture; it seems as if the British born designer has a real appreciation and understanding of what it’s like to be an adolescent American growing up outside the big cities.
