ANDREA POMPILIO F/W 2015 MENSWEAR

MILAN, ITALY [JANUARY 17, 2015] – If Andrea Pompilio’s Fall collection wasn’t quite worthy of a victory roll, it certainly deployed great consistency in its exploration of controlled exuberance through uniform. The starting point was the tropes of military airwear: jumpsuits, officers’ tunics, bomber jackets, and those massive aviator jackets cinched in at the waist from the days when piloting was done alfresco in Sopwiths. On these were the shadows of chevrons, stripes, flashes, and military shields, as if they’d been unstitched when the jackets were decommissioned before being sold into surplus. Pompilio then reimagined his source material in monochrome gray or khaki, occasionally machine-gunned with flashes of scarlet, pink, and queasy yellow. A little turbulence occasionally diverted the course; a double-face lemon biker looked like it was sourced from the wrong mood board. But Pompilio’s high-patch-pocket jackets over loose regimental-striped trousers reasserted formation.

Funny little kit bags, unfortunately strapped shoes, and a lot of “AP” branding strafed the senses, but Pompilio’s idea, although narrow, left him room for expressive maneuvers. A beast of a gray alpaca aviator with complementarily accented hems and a gray-on-pale-yellow double-breasted overcoat with a broad gray belt were both beguiling.