Hushed Tones

Simple, wearable forms speak of a quiet revolution

- Dal Chodha

Between 1987 and 1996, the Japanese photographer Shoichi Aoki captured fashion editors at Paris Fashion Week, striding across cobbled courtyards in high-waisted long black skirts and modest, matching jackets, or sitting together, hashing out the collections in smart peacoats and thick brown corduroy trousers. Unstaged and unfiltered, the images documented an industry that was indifferent to our gaze, on the cusp of the pomp and celebrity the digital age would bring.

Today’s around-the-shows looks are knowingly bold and shamelessly brash. Yet, while René Storck’s nubby grey wool top or Dušan’s sinuous inky velvet tunic may struggle for attention next to the orgy of print and pattern on display, a new, muted mood is gaining momentum. ‘If you talk to a lot of people who have worked in fashion for more than ten years, they want to be more laid-back,’ says Canadian photographer-turned-fashion designer Tommy Ton. ‘Everyone is overwhelmed.’

A lot has changed since 2005, when Ton launched Jak & Jil, an online diary of photographs snapped at the doorways to fashion shows around the world. Back then, his lens zoomed into the fall of the latest collar or the fold of an off-the-runway cuff. He recorded the pageantry that seemed a reaction to the diktat of black neutrality as the industry norm. It was a time when neutral colours couldn’t pop from screens – when e-commerce pioneers such as Net-A-Porter pushed bold, energetic styles.