Unless you’re a massive music buff, you’d be forgiven for not knowing The Cramps, the ‘80s Californian punk band who last played a decade ago and who counts Acne Studios creative director Jonny Johansson as a fan. A quick spin on Google revealed a flamboyant bravado and attitude in spades.
PVC bumsters and heels for all? Definitely, and you could find these peppered through the collection, when there were pants at all. Going out in your best underwear seems to be a thing and Johansson is definitely onto that. And yet if you’re not the kind of person who traipses around in pantless and fancy free, you definitely could count on the roomy coats in thick worsted wool or vinyl and ballooning trousers. Snaps were used instead of studs. For 2016’s neo-punk,
Wire cages outlined pockets and pulled the generous outerwear proportions in for something more congruent with the feminine form.
But imagine yourself a kid in Swedish seaside, all punked up and nowhere to go yet. Acne’s girl was definitely there, taking the materials at hand to craft a wardrobe for herself. That was one way of reading the security orange quilting that was cut into puffy jackets worn off the shoulders, the overalls and the giant buckles that looked like they could have been purloined off a crate. It felt like a continuation of his mountaineering of yesteryear. As for the footwear, that’s when things got a little fishier. There were heels featuring the A and S of Acne Studios in the band’s Crypt Tales-ish font, rope sandals, PVC bits, sandals looking like recycled flotsam, and flat-footed straight over-the-knee boots that ended up looking like weird waders.
It wasn’t the most straightforwardly desirable Acne offering, and Johansson has definitely pushed his boat out quite far in the conceptual this time. It took a while to warm up to it. But if the canvas waders were a bit too far in the shallows, those coats and the corded net bags with their lush leather interior definitely counted as the catch of the day.
