This pre-Fall 2024 Mugler lineup features Casey Cadwallader’s first formal men’s offering for the house. You may remember that his H&M x Mugler capsule featured men’s looks, and if you’ve seen the designer IRL or URL (i.e. on Instagram), you may have noticed that he was his own test subject. “Menswear used to be a bit of a naughty afterthought for me, just putting a few guys on the catwalk,” he said, “but now it’s real. We have men’s brass, style numbers, the whole thing.
In a sense, Mugler men already existed. Cadwallader has indicated in the past that his editing and creative process are fluid when it comes to who’s wearing what. “The fit of the women’s baggy jeans came from a men’s fit, so it was easy to put them back on a man,” he said, and many of his custom women’s jackets are cut to men’s proportions. “They only look authentically menswear if they fit a man well, so I would try them on myself regardless of how we fit them.” All this said, the retail side of the industry still functions on a binary system. By formally offering men’s clothing, Mugler can refine the fit and sizing of the pieces that men (et al.) were already purchasing from the women’s racks.
This is also the first pre-collection Mugler has released since resort 2021. The brand was exploring a see-now, buy-now format, which it has moved away from with the arrival of Adrian Corsin as managing director last May. This is the second pre-collection Cadwallader has worked on since that appointment, and the first to be released publicly on this platform.
Now you’re all in, so let’s get to the clothes. “I don’t want Mugler to stay dry, even a pre-collection,” said Cadwallader. The way he kept things juicy here was a fabrication. A slouchy suit in Japanese moiré velvet, a seductive flowing mesh dress with flocked velvet tiles, a sexy sheath with laser-cut leather feathers and an extremely cool and very smooth jacket in “ultrasonic welded rubber” were all in the mix. “It still has to be decadent,” Cadwallader said.
The MVP of the lineup is the tailoring, which maintains Cadwallader’s signature razor sharpness with a renewed sense of elegance. Pre-collections, he explained, are an opportunity to explore Mugler’s minimalist side. “For me, minimalism is Mies van der Rohe,” he said (this is a good time to remind you that he is a trained architect). “It’s not boring, but extremely neurotically perfect.” Examples include: the extra-wide shoulders are supported by boning to prevent collapsing, the knots have been erased and each line has been carefully placed.
