This afternoon, in Paris’s Musée Rodin, Irish designer Jonathan Anderson presented his latest collection for the house of Dior. Today’s catwalk marked Anderson’s second menswear show and third runway overall, featuring an eclectic mix of references over the course of 63 looks. There were nods to the late, great Pam Hogg in the sunshine yellow wigs, design parallels with Poiret, one of fashion’s founding fathers, plus a character study of today’s aristocratic youth. (For our full show review, click here).
As the show started, though, we couldn’t help but notice the unmistakable sound of mk.gee’s track “Alesis” blare through the speakers, from his record Two Star & The Dream Police (the one that topped our Best Albums list back in 2024). Later on in the show, mk.gee’s single “ROCKMAN” appeared on the soundtrack, before “Alesis” returned during the finale to close out the show.
While Anderson has just announced LaKeith Stanfield, Josh O’Connor and Drew Starkey as menswear ambassadors, it looks like he’s got another man in his sights too. Not only did Mk.gee’s music dominate today’s soundtrack, but it turns out that the New Jersey musician was actually on the moodboard too. After the show, Anderson revealed to reporters that, along with Poiret and the Aristo-youth, he’d recently encountered the former Dazed cover star, and he’d inspired the AW26 show. “I’d met this amazing singer and musician called Mk.gee,” he told Vogue Runway. “I was trying to work out what these characters would be together, as a new radical.”
Across the collection, the musician’s laidback, grungy style was telegraphed through things like boxy parkas, denim cargos and vintage-inspired knits, but it was the show’s closing look – slouchy bottoms, flannel and a ski jacket – that was straight of the Mk.gee playbook. From Omar Apollo and Kit Connor, to Taylor Russell and Mike Faist, Anderson filled his past campaigns at Loewe with all of his favourite artists, so maybe Mk.gee is being courted as we speak? Let’s wait and see.
