Everything
As one of the globe’s biggest luxury menswear e-tailers, Mr Porter has been driving some of the biggest collaborations of the season. Following on from a mammoth ‘The Tee Store Launch’ earlier last month, the style giant has tapped namesake label AMIRI for tropical inspired threads, just in time for an Australian summer. Developed under the direction of brand founder Mr Mike Amiri, the recently-released capsule is a vibrant collection of aloha shirts, graphic prints, SoCal tie-dyes, Baja flannels and distressed denim featuring ready to wear and sneakers.
“My favourite places in the world all have palm trees with a cool breeze,” says Amiri on the collection title, ‘Palm Trees and a Cool Breeze’. “It is actually just as much of a statement of a general spirit of relaxation as it is an actual place.”
The 31-piece collection is inspired by the laid-back and carefree spirit of an elusive punk surfer and has been created with AMIRI’s signature West Coast rock ’n’ roll attitude and meticulous approach to deconstruction. In an ICON exclusive, we gain insight into the threads behind the silhouettes, according to Mr Porter Buying Manager Daniel Todd.
On how the collection was built…
“As with many of the most successful exclusive collections we have done over the years, the idea came about quite organically. AMIRI has grown to be one of our top-performing brands globally, so we were already thinking of how we could grow the partnership and offer our customers something they couldn’t find anywhere else.
We approached AMIRI with an initial idea and from there on it was all down to the work of Mike and his creative team. When we met at AMIRI’s LA studio in September last year to look at the mood boards, we were blown away by how strong the collection looked. It’s always great to work on a project like this with a brand that you have seen go from strength to strength each season.”
On why it is unique…
“When we first started about pitching this idea to AMIRI, one of the images we kept referencing was a picture of Neil Young on Malibu beach in the 1970s. He’s wearing a plaid shirt and jeans and the look perfect encapsulates the mix of laid-back California surf with rock ’n’ roll spirit that we wanted to capture with this collection. Our customers love AMIRI staples such as the destroyed denim and printed shirts and this collection gives them a fresh summer update. I think it’s just a very cool, easy to wear collection.”
On how the collaboration came about…
“We have forged a strong relationship with the AMIRI team since we launched the brand as part of Made In California in 2017 and it’s been great to see them go from strength to strength to become one of our most important brands. We are always looking to offer our customers a point of difference and exclusive projects are the perfect vehicle to allow us to do this. The idea for the project really came about after we saw the SS20 show in Paris, the collection felt like a real statement and we knew immediately it would resonate with our customer. From there it was about working with the AMIRI team to take the 1970s bohemian surf vibe of the show and mix it with the rock ’n’ roll edge of the brand that we know resonates so well with our customers.”
On key pieces from the collection.
“For me, the strength of this collection is in the use of print and colour and two great examples of these are the airbrush denim jacket and the silk camp-collar shirts with the egret print. Denim is a big part of our business with AMIRI, so it’s great to have some exclusives on these as we know our customer can’t get enough of this style.”
The Mr Porter x AMIRI collection is available now.
