The Purple Label collection was a look back — in all the right ways. The designer, who staged his 50th-anniversary show in September, took piles of prints, accessories and other pieces from the archive and spun them into a collection that was high on glamour, and soft edges.
A horsey theme cantered through the collection, via an early Nineties pattern with stirrups and bits flashing from the underside of coats, hand-painted onto jeans and other denim, or laser-cut and bonded onto a suede jacket. The stirrup appeared as a shiny feature around the heels of boots, or as buckles on sporty shoes done in tartan and suede.
The designer also turned to one of his all-time favorites, velvet, for tone-on-tone day suits — including velvet shirts and ties. A signature purple suit, worn with white shirt and black tie, offered a fresh take on formal — and Oscar — dressing. Lauren worked another beloved fabric, cashmere, into everything from featherweight, unlined jackets to tartan dinner ones and covetable cable knit sweaters.
Ralph Lauren Purple Label Men's Fall 2019
36 Photos
The collection offered up other comforts, too, in the form of a long, fuzzy faux shearling made with fabric from Steiff, and a lineup of Ralph Lauren bears on sweaters, one imitating Lauren’s pose in jodhpurs on a recent cover of Town & Country, and another swooshing down the slopes wearing little plastic goggles and heading toward the future at high speed.