My Moscow jaunt for Cycles and Seasons is still cycling and in motion and yes, there will be actual clothes/shows to talk up eventually. Laziness? Procrastination? Too much vodka and borscht? I'm keeping schtum as to why I'm being so laxed but I promise that this highly curated fashion 'festival' (as opposed to week) has a lot to give yet. I'll start though with my first point of research for any new city I visit - the shops.
As airhead-ish as that is, and even if Moscow isn't particularly well-known for its shopping, seeing the retail scene in any city is a somewhat of a useful gauge for its fashion scene and independent boutiques are in some cases throw a hell of a clue to what is going on. Add the obvious prohibitive fact that any imported brands (European, British, American...) has some very inflated prices (import tax and store mark-ups combined) and basically this was purely an eyewitness excercise where no credit card usage was involved.
I guess that would be the crucial axial point with a lot of the stores here. If it's so expensive, why buy foreign labels in Moscow when you can travel to the originating countries to get em. This Business Week article goes some way to explaining the mere existence of multi-brand boutiques with clothes priced double what it would be in their originating country. Having spoken to a few people here, my thoughts are that to generalise, there's always going to be a domestic customer around who is willing to splash the cash as well as buying pieces in a familiar environment and geographical context.
Enough of the socio-economics behind Moscovites' spending habits... and onto the shops...
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Air is perhaps a store that I wouldn't mind seeing transplanted to London. Albeit with lighter price tags. Tucked away in an alleyway, the shop stocks a mix of Japanese labels and distinctive-signature designers such as Bernhard Willhelm and Walter van Beirendonck. I suppose the import tax problem hits the UK when it comes to getting Japanese designers here but still I admire the endeavours of Air's gathering of Japanese designers. I get the feeling the clothes at Air are eager to reflect the aesthetic of 'kooky' looks continually perpetuated in the tomes of Fruits but I suppose that's no bad thing when you accumulate pieces from the likes of Mintdesigns, mercibeaucoup, Theatre Products and best of all Nozomi Ishiguro, whose S/S 11 new stock I tried on.
I found out about Nozomi Ishiguro from the store Liger in Hong Kong and in Air, they've also got a number of choice pieces including this belt/skirt/kilt/bag/ combo - it's pretty much non existent at the back which makes this a rather unique interpretation of the sort of 'belt' skirts that erm... Jodie Harsh favoured back in the day...
Another Nozomi Ishiguro outfit with this printed poet's shirt and scallop-edged layered mint culottes which in itself could sound like a 17th century costume... I very nearly got the culottes, swayed by all that mint green but alas I got the Rouble conversion incorrect in my head and the real price was pretty steep...
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Project 3.14 is a fairly new addition to Moscow's shop scene and is the primary subject of that Business Week article, which tracks the rise of high-end boutiques in Moscow (with a slightly cliched-led tone I might add - "the typical customer is in his mid-30s and rich. He has a mullet, bad taste, and a man crush on Vladimir Putin"). This blog post here sheds more light about the store's ethos but it's mainly a menswear store but has just started buying womenswear lightly and I can only describe the selection as Italo avant garde - Lost and Found, MA+, Alessandra Marchi - a shaded side to Italy-based designers that make more of a shout in sales than in shows/presentations. Add to the mix Damir Doma and Carol Christian Poell and you get the idea of the sort of clothes that one might find - shades of griege, draped jersey and leather panels everywhere.
i was delighted to see Argentinian label Trosman in the store and the black beading that looks almost reptilian in the S/S 11 collection is a stunning surface textural feat seen here in this vest top...
I also love the simplicity of this dress by Alessandra Marchi, a label that just staged a show on a Metro train in Milan for A/W 11-12.
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UK Style does exactly what it says on the tin and in a fine fine way too. A didactic name like that could have pointed in a number of directions (you'd be surprised how brands like Ben Sherman, All Saints etc get associated with the term 'UK Style' for some...) but with a selection that includes Mary Katrantzou, Peter Jensen, Sophie Hulme, Jonathan Saunders and Markus Lupfer, it's definitely the sort of UK style I'm down with. With APC, Opening Ceremony and Swedish brands like Rodebejer thrown in for good measure, the mix is both approachable and interesting.
Of course, it wouldn't make sense for me to be going to a shop like UK Style in Moscow to do any actual shopping but it's always good to do a bit of flag waving. Yay for Brits and all of that...
I did however see these Richard Nicoll prints and wondered why I've never seen these sales collection pieces before...I can attest that everyone needs a Richard Nicoll x Linder Sterling silk tunic in their lives...
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It's a bit lazy and airy fairy, but somehow colette comes up as the most oft-used point of comparison when you see other multi-brand concept stores - "It's colette on acid.", "Mini colette", "colette wannabe." - I suppose that's testament to how much of a benchmark the Parisian concept store has set. Kuznetsky Most 20 aka KM20 (because I can't for the life of me pronounce Russian names properly...) is probably Moscow's answer to colette only because it has the gallery/cafe/shop hybrid formula down to a tee. KM20's selection is pretty faultless in my eyes. Seeing as nearby department store Tsum sells all the Paris/Milan biggies, KM20 opts for labels that could either be seen as established or not depending on the eyes. Cue more British friends like Ashish, Mark Fast and Sibling, whose grafitti sweater I couldn't resist slipping on...
I almost bought these Dr. Martens hiking patent boots and then slapped myself - DOH, I come from land of DMs - it would be ridiculous to buy them in Moscow...
I haven't spotted any Hyde S.K. bags however in London and their website seems to have gone completely AWOL...
Other familiar faces include Arielle di Pinto's knitted chains and Uncommon Matters' porcelain collars.
KM20 also sells Maison Martin Margiela's Artisinal line properly. Nope, it's not just for show. You can buy the pieces too...
Seeing Hussein Chalayan's pieces reminded me I really need to investigate Chalayan's more quiet yet assured route that he has taken these past two seasons. The broderie anglaise trimmed shift dress below (a reference to the lace-covered taxi seats in Tokyo) is particularly beautiful.
In case you were wondering, I wasn't just trying clothes along the shopping tour for the fun of it. Vogue Russia were shooting me for their website along the way to pick out my favourite pieces. KM20 is also one of the few boutiques that actually stocks one of the Cycles and Seasons designers. Nina Donis is a duo label that is showing this Friday and is the name that everyone is super excited about. Their S/S 11 collection is all clean lines and a maximal meets minimal aesthetic effectively deployed in pieces such as this black-trimmed white onesie that ties up at the back. Given that they had their models somersaulting down the runway in their last show, I'm looking foward to what will unfold in their next collection...
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