Lucas Ossendrijver has been in the headlines for a minute. The Dutch designer quit Lanvin to return to 2018, back in France where he invented The brand has for many years started its menswear code more or less from scratch and, at least in part, led the high-fashion sneaker trend that still dominates today, but lately he’s been busy behind the scenes. Last July, Theory announced that it had hired Ossendrijver to design the capsule collection. Many Paris-New York round trips followed, and next month his first offering for the company, which has long focused on workwear tailoring, will arrive in stores.
“I’ve always loved Theory as a brand and what it stands for,” Ossendrijver told me during a Bali vacation in August. “It has something very functional, and as a design concept, I think it’s a bit close. Also, because Theory is a big company, the decisions you make have an impact. We use a lot of sustainable fabrics – recycled wool, Recycled nylon — and the effect is real. It’s not a niche brand, it’s not just marketing, it’s not a runway show that you have to lure with extreme claims. In that sense, it’s very human. It felt more rewarding than trying to do another luxury item or another fashion show. That, and the opportunity to do womenswear alongside menswear is what attracted me.”
Movement is another guiding principle. Another silk dress, with its layered écrasé pleats, gave a slight nod to the late Alber Elbaz, Ossendrijver’s former colleague and mentor at Lanvin, whose clothes, despite their beauty, always pleased women, Not the other way around. “Alber,” Ossendrijver said, “was both father and brother. The most valuable thing I learned from him was being able to step back and see with other people’s eyes. It really helped Concentrate your information and sometimes get rid of useless or unnecessary stuff.”
