LUXURY BEFORE LOGOS

Where menswear brands come and go, their currency peaking and plateauing like stocks, the quiet coolness of Hermès has never really wavered. On a recent trip to Seoul, we met with Véronique Nichanian, the long-standing artistic director behind the most consistent, most coveted brand in men’s fashion today

- AMY CAMPBELL

Soon after arriving in the South Korean capital of Seoul late last year – pre-pandemic – Véronique Nichanian found herself observing the outfit of a young man on the street. There was a lot to take in – three or four different brand names and logos in large fonts vied for the French designer’s attention, like neon signs in the city’s famous Gangnam-gu district. “I was thinking to myself, what does this mean? What does this express about himself?” Nichanian wonders aloud with a shrug that implies slight frustration at the s-word that’s dominated menswear for the last few seasons. “I didn’t understand it. The logomania, I hate it.”