Seven years into his tenure as creative director of Dior Homme, it’s safe to say that Kris Van Assche has hit his stride. “One of his strongest collections yet,” said Style.com’s Tim Blanks of the Winter 2014 collection. Good news for Dior and Van Assche, because on Friday, the collection was shown in Shanghai, an important market for the house. Before the show, the busy designer found some time to chat with Style.com about Dior the global brand and what it’s like designing for men all over the world.

—Noah Johnson
Why is it important for you to present the collection in Asia?

It’s become very, very important for Dior Homme as a brand, and so I’m very exited about that because it’s basically proof of how well Dior Homme is doing. We had our first show one year ago in Beijing, which was a huge success, so we’re doing it again now in Shanghai.

So the Beijing show last year, was that your first show you’d done in Asia?

Yeah. We had never had a show outside of Paris before.

What was that experience like?

It was a great experience because I’m used to doing a show only once. Bringing it all to a different country—it’s quite something. We’re trying to keep it interesting, you know? We make a different set, so everybody gets a different view on things. We do a local casting as well. We have to fly in the ateliers to do the fittings on the new guys and all that, so it brings along quite a lot of work, but it’s exciting because it actually allows you to see the same clothes on local guys, and so that together with the new setup makes it a new experience. For me, it’s less stressful because I kind of know that everything will be OK in the first show, so it’s a more enjoyable experience.

It’s interesting that you do a local casting. Do you see the clothes in a new way? Do you feel like they’re worn differently?

Well, even when we’re doing castings in Paris, seeing five hundred guys in castings, picking out the forty-five we’re actually going to use…I mean, the same jacket is going to look different on every guy anyway. So I’m not so surprised about that. And it has nothing to do with continents, Asia, Europe, whatever. That’s why fittings take so long, because we always try to find the right guy for the right look.

I’m very aware that I work for an international brand—I’m not only working for French guys. The collection is going to be sold throughout the world. It’s not about doing specific clothes for specific continents or specific people because it doesn’t really work like that. But you kind of have a worldwide view in a way.

So who is the client?

At Dior Homme, there’s not one type of client—you have different types of clients. You have a very traditional made-to-measure tailoring type of guy and then you have a very high-end fashion type of client and you have whatever’s in between. That’s the case usually in Paris, but it’s the case all over the world. If you go to Asia, you have real fashion people. They really go for the full-on fashion pieces. And then you have some very demanding, tailoring, made-to-measure clients. So you have these different demands of different types of clients, but you come across all of them on all continents.

When you’re designing, do you have that range of clients in mind?

It comes with the job. And my last show in January was really about exposing all that. The first silhouette of this show was a three-piece suit, a really made-to-measure suit with what I call the “Savile Row tradition” very much linked to the personality of Dior Homme. That was look one. And then the last outfit was really about white sneakers, baggy trousers, jeans, and all that. So that’s how big the difference gets at Dior Homme. The high-end tailoring makes my sportswear more luxurious and the activewear makes the tailoring more comfortable, easier to wear. So one constantly influences the other.

Are there other places in the world you would like to bring your collection?

It’ll probably one day make sense to take the shows to Brazil because everybody knows it’s a top growing market and there’s a lot of interesting stuff going on there, but it’s really not on the agenda. For now, we’re really concentrating on Europe, the United States, China, Japan.

I know you’re also coming to New York soon, and you have the pop-up for the Dior Homme Autumn collection with M/M (Paris). Can you tell me a little about that?

I very much like these projects for the Autumn and Spring collections because it’s almost like shows in Paris—one show each, we just do it once, and so it’ll be a premiere. It’s very exciting. I’m actually there in the same space as the client and you get a much more direct reaction from people of whatever you’re presenting. Because behind the scenes for a show, it’s really behind the scenes—you basically wait [until] the day after to see whatever people thought. It’s an interesting experience—it’s a little scary because you’re in the middle of the room, but it’s nice. I very much love working with M/M. They always take things to another step, another level. It’s an inspiring exercise.

Photo: Courtesy of Dior Homme

CREDITS:STYLECOM

CREDITS:STYLECOM

If Melinda Gloss cofounders Mathieu de Ménonville and Rémi de Laquintaine seemed slightly jittery before presenting their Spring menswear collection, they sure didn’t look it. Both disarmingly attractive, the guys are their own model customers, applying their confident mien to a contemporary-classic range that has steadily built a following among young, discerning fashion types.

For their Friday show, models walked through the cloisters of a 17th-century abbey, the Cloître de Port-Royal, in the far south of Paris. The designers, who met while studying philosophy at the Sorbonne, said they chose this obscure venue for the color of its stone and the natural light—but of course, it also speaks to their pursuit of a distinctive identity. They proposed a collection loosely based on a nostalgic view of travel, refreshing fifties-era tailoring by offering double-breasted blazers in softened neoprene. Roomy, pleated trousers sat higher on the waist—and puddled perfectly around white canvas Spring Court kicks. Their exploration of print, which they described as loosely African, included a large pair of abstracted shells as a knitwear intarsia and a geometric micro motif in repetition across a silk blouson and masculine foulards. The main showpieces, however, were the leather goods: a vivid blue in lambskin, suede pants the color of wet sand, and a shirt in dusty stucco. Square-framed duffel bags in sturdy calfskin were well-constructed and sized for daily city needs or overnight trips.

Melinda Gloss manufactures its suiting in France, said De Ménonville. Stitched inside one of the brand’s jackets, a label proudly read, “Confectionné en Limoges.” Confectionné conveys a savoir faire that its English equivalent, made, is unable to capture. And as the four-year-old brand pushes further into international markets (apparently Japanese customers have already proved widely receptive), craft will matter as much as Parisian cool.

In September, the duo expects to open their third Paris location—a flagship on the Boulevard des Filles du Calvaire, steps from Acne Studios, A.P.C., and Ami. In positioning Melinda Gloss as entry-level Hermès, the designers are convinced that the brand is a key player in a coveted niche—call it low-key luxe—now brimming with options. Certainly, they’re ones to watch.

—Amy Verner

Photos: Courtesy Photos
CREDITS:STYLECOM