Inspired by Uncle Sam | Bangkok Post: lifestyle

MEN'S FASHION

We're headed into dark times, and if you haven't sensed it from the European debt crisis or political tensions in the Gulf, you can possibly sense it at the Menswear Fashion Week Autumn/Winter 2012-2013 staged in Milan and Paris over the past two weeks.

As an unlucky bunch of professionals whose work revolves around future money _ since designers work on collections that will not reach their customers until six month afterwards _ they have mastered the art of fortune-telling. The collective view of designers as to how you should be dressed from this September to next January could at times probably say more about the world we're moving towards than the stock indexes.

For the next autumn, the wardrobe is about classic tailoring _ investment pieces _ with a nod to bankers and stock brokers in tailored office suits. Such perspective is closely intertwined with a recurrent study in the plight of the blue-collared workers who are generally viewed as the main victims at times of economic crisis. Designers look at the months ahead as days of uncertainty during which both blue-collared workers and white-collared professionals may be indiscriminatingly plunged into the deepest despair. As the tailored suit is a seasonal staple, the likes of Junya Watanabe and Kris van Assche explore blue-collared uniforms, the former for the nostalgic check shirt and bib-front overalls, while the latter, in his own label, throws together in one look the uniforms of blue-collared workers and white-collared professionals. "For me, both are realities of menswear, and I get inspired by both," Van Assche told reporters after the show.