Paul Smith takes inspiration from his travels on a regular basis but, for his latest collection shown at Paris Fashion Week yesterday afternoon, stayed relatively closer to home.
He drew his material from his amateur photographer father’s archive, Harold B Smith. Entrants accessed the room via a constructed darkroom filled with emulsion buckets, stretched-out negatives, and a stainless steel sink. There was also on each seat a booklet comprising a selection of his father’s output-the founding member of the Beeston camera club in Nottinghamshire.
Instead of a traditional catwalk show, models emerged in threes as Smith narrated each look. This was an intimate approach that contrasted sharply with the gargantuan spectacles that have become luxury fashion’s standard. At Smith’s gathering, the guest list hovered around the 200 mark. At Louis Vuitton the night before, there were close to 2,000.
“We’re not one of the big groups, so what can you do,” he mused backstage when asked about his approach. “The asset is a human being who can chat about things.”
And chat he did. Smith may be only a couple of years off his 80th birthday but he is showing no signs of switching to the slow lane. Instead, he leapt about, enthusing over fabrics, cuts, the line on a glove, the height of a shoe and his father’s messy doodles that he used as prints across knitwear and tailoring.
At one point, he produced a mooing toy cow from a bag. At another, a plastic egg from a shoe – his signature glorious, grey bouffant adding to the mad professor vibe. This was British eccentricity at its finest, only heightened by some slightly confused French editors who remained poker-faced throughout.
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Paul Smith’s Paris Fashion Week Collection: A Blend of Tradition and Modern Style
Paul Smith mentioned that his father was one of those observers, often capturing little moments that other people would have missed. This gene seems to have been passed down to Smith junior.
Paul Smith is renowned for his meticulous attention to detail, even in aspects that often go unnoticed. This was evident throughout his Paris Fashion Week collection. Corduroy trousers were printed on the inside to evoke a vintage aesthetic, while the linings of jackets showcased enlarged prints from his father’s negatives, adding a personal and unexpected touch. Smith’s signature playful spirit extended to the finer details: ties and shirts were designed in complementary fabrics, a clever styling trick he learned from his friend, the legendary photographer David Bailey. Bailey, in turn, had acquired this technique during his time in the Royal Air Force, a testament to the enduring influence of unexpected sources on even the most celebrated creative minds.
While these were clothes for the modern man, Smith used age-old techniques and fabrics to make sure they stay the test of time. The thornproof tweed trousers come from a bygone era specifically designed for the hunter to withstand brambles. Among the upcoming collab with Barbour is its signature parka with a playful twist, while hoods can be mixed and matched.
He also dove into his own archive. Clingy knitted jumpers in satsuma orange and plum started off as form-fitting jumpers that he used to dress clients like David Bowie with during the 70s. At the time, he could not afford to make them so he had used to purchase jumpers from the schoolboy section of his local department store.
While the mood in the room was upbeat, it’s been a difficult period for the brand, with Brexit, Covid, the war in Ukraine (Smith closed his Russian stores in 2023) and the loss of tax-free shopping for tourists. It has endured five consecutive years of losses, with the most recent numbers reporting a pre-tax loss of £5.3m for the 12 months to 30 June 2024 compared with a loss of £2.3m in the previous year.
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