Fashion

Bethany Williams Men’s Fall 2019

Bethany Williams’ third collection was called “Adelaide House,” after a women’s shelter in Liverpool that caters to the needs of females, including domestic abuse, homelessness and post-imprisonment — one of only six such facilities in the U.K.

Williams tapped the talents of artist Giorgia Chiarion for this season, resulting in a series of portraits of Adelaide House residents and abstract paintings of Liverpool’s landscape, the latter of which Williams incorporated into the lineup.

Liverpool, in England’s north, is generally accepted to be a fairly gray sort of place, but Chiarion depicted it in bold primary shades that, in turn, were applied to Williams’ playful coed collection made, as always, from recycled and organic materials.

Bethany Williams Men's Fall 2019


8 Photos 

She worked with the Liverpool Echo newspaper to utilize newspaper waste, coating thin strips in wax then weaving it — through the aid of San Patrignano, a drug rehabilitation center in Italy — into a richly textured material, which Williams put to work in a nice A-line coat with patch pockets and a boxy shirt jacket and matching trousers.

She used recycled denim in jackets and jeans, printed with Chiarion’s abstract shapes, or in a clean off-white boiler suit featuring the delicate line-drawn portraits of Adelaide House.

The star look of the lineup was a wonderfully cozy cream sweater and blouson track pant ensemble, hand-knitted by Williams’ mother, Cecile Tulkens, with more of those abstract shapes. It was part retro-ski but very right now.