JW Anderson’s Gender Subverting Collection

JW Anderson is back at Milan fashion week with a subversive new collection. The show was full of bizarre details, including frog shoes, a frog purse, pillows as accessories, and tomatoes painted onto the skin of models. 

Courtesy of Vogue

Jonathan Anderson, who is the creative director of Loewe, established his own label in 2008. From the outset, JW Anderson has challenged gender norms with its looks, and this season’s fall/winter 2023 collection is no different. 

This collection’s questioning of gender norms, and what men must wear to be taken seriously, was interesting and well executed. There were t-shirts with vintage male erotica printed on them. Many of the clothing, including coats, shirts, pants, and blazers had feminine cuts, and there were even a couple of leather mini dresses in the collection. The models, with pretty faces and blown out hair, had an androgynous look, which tied in nicely to the theme of the show. The message came through effectively yet, on the whole, remained subtle. 

If you look only at the clothes, this was a very simple collection. Pieces stood alone; long coats, oversized sweaters, and even underwear with infantile prints were worn on their own down the runway. The choice to let pieces shine and show one or two items at a time was a good one, especially because the accessories and makeup stole the show anyway. 

While the clothes were nice, and there were some pieces that were especially interesting, the accessories and makeup distracted heavily from the clothing itself. The frog clogs in particular stole the show; made in collaboration with Welliboots, these shoes have traditionally only been made for children, and were famously worn by Princes William and Harry in their youth. Shown in bright yellow and forest green, these frog shoes show Anderson’s playful, nostalgic style. The frog bag, similarly, calls back to Anderson’s infamous pigeon bag while tying in thematically to the current collection. 

Other aspects of the show, however, seem random and attention grabbing to a fault. What is the point of painting realistic tomatoes all over the body of a model wearing a monochromatic bodysuit with a pillow attached to the front? Similarly, there are two looks in which the models have either blue and white or pink and white painted in a swirl over their face. While this may tie in to the theme of gender insubordination, this makeup looks out of place to the point that it is difficult to remember what the model was wearing in the first place.

Courtesy of Vogue

Overall, this collection has something for everyone, from soft hoodies to leather mini dresses, and everything in between. For a collection so simple, there is a surprising amount of variety, which proves that Anderson remembers that by upturning gender roles, there must be room for any style. That said, most people will probably look at this collection and remember two things; frog clogs and frog purses. The question remains- is that the point, or is that a problem?