Heron Preston (Q4278)
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Heron Preston is a fashion house from FMD.
| Language | Label | Description | Also known as |
|---|---|---|---|
| English | Heron Preston |
Heron Preston is a fashion house from FMD. |
Statements
Tonight at a vacant loft in lower Manhattan, one of the most anticipated runway shows of the week opened with one of the most mundane scenes you can spot in the city: a man in an orange safety vest spray painting a white line on the bare concrete floor. Then came another one, who doodled a blue path, and eventually a third, whose hue was an orange to match the men’s three vests. A few seconds later, the crowd erupted into applause. “The artist is present,” aVoguecolleague quipped.The artist in question was Heron Preston, who was showing as part of New York Fashion Week for the very first time—yes,really. Preston is based in the city and has found considerable inspiration in its mean streets and colorful characters, but he has not shown a collection here since his collaboration with the New York Department of Sanitation back in 2016. Tonight’s staging also marked his return to the runway since before the pandemic—it was a homecoming in more ways than one.“I was looking at the streets as a soundboard to direct the collections,” Preston said backstage, “I’ve always said that the face of fashion is all of us.” That starting point explains the seemingly unmethodical styling and hodgepodge lineup. There was a method to the madness, however. “It’s fun to see someone make real clothes,” said a fellow editor; another added “the cool kids dress like this”—therealcool kids you see at raves in Ridgewood, or bumming cigarettes and sitting on stoops across SoHo and the Lower East Side.Sweatpants with high heels, and crisp button-downs with ties walked alongside utility vests styled over hoodies and workout shorts accompanied by waffle knit long johns. Chainmail slips, mini skirts, and bralettes were layered over catsuits, jeans, and sweatshirts, respectively, while luscious floor length silk skirts and dresses were dressed down with moto jerseys, graphic jackets, and mid-cropped down puffers. Laced up going out tops and corsets peeked from under shaggy faux fur jackets, and tweed separates were paired with sweatpants and balaclavas. Chaotic as this all sounds, the models looked like characters off the street. Preston is an observer, and knows that many of the young folks consuming his show through images and videos are styling the pieces in their wardrobes with this same “anything goes” approach—which, by the way, is the title he gave to this collection.Preston said he was looking at found objects.
He created chainmail inspired by fences, placed carabiners as branded accents on his handbags and closures on his tailoring, and used level tools as heels on shoes and classic blue construction tarp as clever flanges where he placed grommets (the tarp will prevent the fabric underneath the hardware of fraying over time). The show’s invitation consisted of discarded objects he collected himself. A piece of industrial cardboard here, an empty bottle of liquid soap there. He knows most physical invites go straight into the bin, and decided to make the process circular by using existing trash that will stay trash. (There’s no little irony in shipping those invites via the mail, but Preston’s intention is clear and deserves some props.)“I wanted to create the experience that when you walk into the space there is nothing, and when you leave there is something left behind,” Preston said of the lines he and his team painted on the floor at the start of the show. Mission more than likely accomplished—we’ll surely spot a few of the pieces from tonight’s show on one of the celebrities that sat front row soon enough.
11 February 2023
Heron Preston always has an eye to the street. Back in his Nike days, he was endlessly fascinated by how all kinds of people from different cultures would adopt a given sneaker style and make it their own. “I’m interested in approaching a collection as a study in style codes and designing into how people wear clothes in real life, not on Instagram,” Preston said. “I’ve always said that the face of fashion is all of us.”For spring, he turned his gaze on New York’s post-pandemic scene and what he calls “coming back into the wild.” In particular, he said he wanted to home in on sartorial archetypes that become one with the cityscape.First stop: Orchard Street, that fierce style corridor between the Lower East Side and Chinatown. It’s a fair bet that the latest iteration of Preston’s money print—an embroidered white leather jacket that riffs on pre-Euro currency, the late Queen’s likeness and Preston’s own imaginary bills—will crop up there early. Ditto the racecar bootleg, faux basketball gear, and bogus law school tees, all examples of what the designer calls “instant language”: at once new, familiar, and inherently inclusive.Sustainability and eco-materials—nicknamed LED (Less Environmentally Destructive) products—are a major touchpoint, accounting for slightly more than half of the collection. “I’m part of the problem, but my question is how can I be part of the solution?” he mused. One way was to land an exclusive on new-gen eco-stretch denim made from Coreva (pictured in Look 11), an innovative fiber originally inspired—believe it or not—by salami casing and developed and patented by the Italian firm Candiani Denim. Because its yarn is made from natural rubber rather than petroleum derivatives, it is 100% biodegradable. Another denim storyline was a ’90s reboot of loose fits in Skittle colors, sometimes with gradient treatments or highlighted seams.Tailoring codes likewise got ripped apart: a backless suit jacket is Preston’s way of revisiting workwear as a gender-free statement piece. Ditto a jacket overlaid in black lace, with a hot orange label peeking through on one cuff. That playful little flourish speaks volumes: Preston’s following knows him by a signpost that can be spotted miles away. A longtime student of iconic brands, the designer is also leaning in on underwear. Not hard to imagine where he might be headed from there.
17 October 2022
Found objects, archetypes, and uniforms are the three bedrocks of Heron Preston’s “instant language.” By incorporating these elements into his design work he aims to fire our synapses with the endorphins of recognition the moment they hit the eye, while simultaneously designing them to be unorthodox enough to trigger the acquisitional adrenaline of intrigue.Either one or the other of those criteria were not satisfyingly enough fulfilled in his spring 2022 season, so Preston elected to jump one step forward for this meet-up and dig into fall 2022 instead. After comparing notes on the “difficult but happy” Louis Vuitton menswear show we just saw in Paris—Preston flew in for his closeconfrere’sposthumously-presented collection from the New Guards studio in Milan adjacent to Virgil’s Off-White team—we got to it.There were several key phrases in this collection’s latest-phase deployment of Preston’s brand langage. One was the black fashion fabrications of the fireman’s jacket and the application of that workwear staple’s key oversized clasps—designed to be easy for gloved hands to clip together or apart—to act as closures for theDSNYbags he has been exploring since 2016.That collaboration, way back when, was catalyzed by Preston’s Saul–like conversion to environmentalism; this season he rolled out a new in-house system for classifying the materials used in his work according to their impact upon our ecosystems. This, he explained, has three tiers that run from “Standard” (less than 50% sustainable and due to be phased out of use altogether by the designer) “Preferred” (50% or more by weight certified sustainable) and finally “eX-Ray”—garments and objects whose materials are “nearly” 100% sustainable, “with everything tracked across the supply chain from raw material provenance to shipping and manufacturing to social and environmental conditions.” Preston said of his new “eX-Ray” classification: “Hopefully one day, you know, other designers can adopt eX-Ray materials into their collections too. The vision is like it becomes a b2b business where there is the possibility of adopting eX-Ray materials—eX-Ray nylon, eX-Ray cotton, eX-Ray jersey—into other collections.”More above-the-bonnet utterances here included denim patched with industrial diamond plate finishing, razor blade and industrial tape finishings and labels, and some cool, long liner coats inspired by moving blankets.
Overdyed denim in emergency orange over black had the intended effect “of looking like it has been run over by a steamroller.” Preston said he’d tried to work against the current popularity of letterman jackets by abstracting the characters on his, and rejected the thought of a rubber rain boot—too fashion-ubiquitous to be cool—in order to develop a new combat boot. His Heron photo-signifier was delivered on a cropped T-shirt wadded internally to give it a look-twice appearance of floating off the body below.Also cropped were the high-waisted workwear jackets worn against baselayer and high boots in his womenswear. Preston said he develops his “HP woman” silhouette by anthropologizing New York cool girls. He said of his findings: “It literally looks like they took their boyfriend’s or their dad’s jacket out of the closet and threw it on and and found a way for it to become theirs and to make it sexy, a pair of high boots or some heels or something form fitting.” Preston has also for the first time this season expanded his label’s output into underwear.
28 January 2022
Heron Preston’s eponymous debut as a fashion designer was in 2016, for the excellent upcycled Uniform collection with New York’s Department of Sanitation. That earned Preston a fan base beyond (and above) fashion populated by those for whomworkwearis not a reference, but a requirement. In the years since, Preston’s Italian-produced line has added womenswear and started showing in Paris, yet all the while retained an audience that appreciates the authenticity of his original expression of workwear.Over Zoom, Preston expanded: “So I have real construction workers who are engaging with my brand. And what I’m hearing from them a lot recently is a complaint, ‘That’s not real workwear—we can’t wear that on job sites!’ And this really started to affect me. I was thinking, Wait, am I doing somethingfakehere? So I’ve started to really question my approach to the stories of collections and designing workwear.”The upshot was a collection (and look book) that not only replicated workwear’s utilitarian aesthetic, but of which some elements represented Preston’s first step towards being true “workwear.” A hooded jacket, a shirt jacket, two zipped polos, and some track pants were all made in an industrial fire-retardant fabric and marked as such. Preston added that his ambition is to achieve OSHA (Occupational Safety and Health Administration) certification—the standard by which workwear in the U.S. is regulated—as he develops this more authentic vision of his source material.This collection was entitled Between Two Worlds to reflect the push and pull Preston is finding himself subject to. There were plenty of pieces that will never make the OSHA grade but which looked good. For women there were tie-dyed spaghetti strap dresses, structured chore jackets over wide-cut pants, oversized tailoring in fleece or black satin, layered opaque camo-print evening pieces, and new kitten-height versions of his spirit-level heel. Menswear included oversized down coats, distressed and dyed denim, plus camo cardigans and shirting.As job-site workwear, Preston’s apparel is not yet “authentic.” However, what is apparent in Preston’s approach to this question (as well as that of sustainability) is that he is unafraid to interrogate his own status as a producer of fashion. Most designers would see that as an occupational hazard to be avoided at all costs, but Preston’s approach is healthier.
1 February 2021
Marooned by travel restrictions across the Atlantic from his design team and factories at New Guards here in Milan, Heron Preston was a little frustrated by the extent to which he was obliged to craft this collection virtually. This evidenced itself most in his look book, for which the designer made prints of the digitally transferred images, then marked and arranged them as he would a running-order board at a real fashion show. He said: “I finished the look book by hand here in New York because I wanted to kind of capture this behind-the-scenes process, which I love. I’ve always been a hands-on person. Even before I joined New Guards, I printed my T-shirts by hand, never with machines…. I’ve got to have some kind of human presence there…so that’s why I finished the look book this way. And that’s why you might see some dust, or a piece of hair that might have gotten stuck on the scan bed! That’s real to me.”The collection that Preston took care to present beneath this patina of analogue process showed that, like so many designers, he has used his time in the great hiatus to double down, to take a look at himself and his product, and to refine his output. The results included an editing of his accessory offering to concentrate on his spirit-level heels and hard tool bag, the two pieces that speak most clearly to his unique selling position as a playful designer of elevated but authentically rooted workwear that references the equipment with which its original consumers ply their trades.Branding and graphics were radically scaled down, even on the Caterpillar collaboration. Most workwear pieces featured a flash of orange on the left sleeve, a return, Preston said, to his early enunciation of brand language, and an act of reduction that he felt was consistent with his sense of maturation. “My 40s are just around the corner now,” the 37(!)-year-old noted: “The use of graphics isn’t something that I’ve departed from, but they are not as loud or in-your-face…when you get older, I think you just realize that you like what you like.” Preston added that his ideal daily outfit—the uniform he’d never get bored of wearing (at least this year)—is something pretty close to look 24, a shorts-and-polo combination whose shirt he was adamant must be fastened by a zipper (“buttons are preppy”) to reflect his workwear yen.
Other interesting realizations were expressed via the strong crocus color story, which went back to the insight that there’s little point in creating elevated staples in colorways that you can easily also purchase staple-staples in. Although nothing from his excellent ongoing Levi’s collaboration appeared here, Preston said, “I am taking some stories from that exercise and applying them to this collection,” specifically the reverse-pocket detail on richly patched pants in raw denim whose low rate of water waste was consistent with the sustainable push also evident in the over-dyed garment-washed tailoring in ethically sourced nylons.This newly pared-down and intellectually elevated iteration of Preston was a positive product of a season spent in enforced absence from his colleagues, and promises much for when they are finally reunited.
30 September 2020
“‘It’s All Good, It’s All Fucked.’ That title comes from an American poet named Juliana Spahr, in a book she wrote calledThat Winter the Wolf Came,and it’s a poem, actually, that describes a very apocalyptic scene,” Heron Preston said backstage. “But during the scene, people are having fun, and they’re dancing and having a great time. And so, it’s a reminder that, you know, even though things are coming to an end, it also represents a new birth. And so that’s what this show is about: things coming apart and putting them back together in better ways.”Although the guest list was still hype-y (and so late!) it feels like some of the broader buzz that once surrounded Preston has dissipated a little. Arguably, this is in his favor: Preston says he has divined that workwear is his thing and here he lovingly reimagined it for men and for women in some clever ways. Bunches of keys clipped to the hips of a corseted workwear carpenter and a blue-shirted, leather-skirted security guard seemed allusively jewel-like. The camouflage pieces, especially the jacquards, were quite fantastic, and there was an interesting collaboration Preston has wrangled with the British Ministry of Defence specific to its deployment of soldiers to train and work alongside park rangers in Africa to combat poachers. His closing recycled polyamide Gore-tex-treated suit was emblematic of the “things coming apart and putting them together in better ways” angle he was riffing on.There also seemed to be another factor at play, unsaid by Preston backstage but one rooted in the demographics, culture, and history of the United States. This was outlined by Nina Simone in a quote sampled in the show soundtrack, and so great it should be reproduced in full: “I think what you’re trying to ask is why am I so insistent upon giving out to them that blackness, that black power, that black pushing them to identify with black culture; I think that’s what you’re asking. I have no choice over it; in the first place, to me we are the most beautiful creatures in the whole world, black people. And I mean that in every sense, outside and inside. And to me we have a culture that is surpassed by no other civilization but we don’t know anything about it.
So again, I think I’ve said this before in this same interview, I think at some time before: My job is to somehow make them curious enough or persuade them, by hook or crook, to get more aware of themselves and where they came from and what they are into and what is already there, and just to bring it out. This is what compels me to compel them and I will do it by whatever means necessary.”
16 January 2020
Swamped by admirers post-show, Heron Preston was asked about the wordshighs and lowswritten below his name and that of the season. He said: “Highs and lows? That’s life in New York. The concrete jungle. This collection is based on big-city life.” Fittingly, this was a show crowded with a broad range of collaborative fellow citizens. In partnership with Los Angeles–based Sami Miro there was an upcycled capsule entitled Natural Disaster (brave name) that included a strongly waisted denim dress and organza-like boob tube. Levi’s pitched in with a collaboration entitled Mistakes Are OK (another brave name), in which Preston worked to subvert the codes of the venerable denim brand by misplacing pockets, belt loops, and buttons. The opening suit in quilted white Tyvek was produced in partnership with the architecture practice Dattner, and the artist Robert Nava lent an angel painting that was reproduced on hoodies, denim, T-shirts and a blazer. Plus there was Gore-Tex-treated outerwear (liberally branded with Gore-Tex technical signifiers) in recycled polyester.The unwelcome whale-tail sighting in womenswear apart—seriously, are we going there again?—this was a neatly assembled all-life-is-here cross section of citywear, running from bombers and field jackets in orange nylon cut in with bouclé to bright loose suiting (including a great yellow-cab print on a women’s short suit) and plenty of black nylon pieces that looked collaborative in spirit too. Nava’s illustrations lent an engaging energy to the pieces upon which they were applied, and smokily deconstructed shades of gray camouflage looked good in menswear. You could feel the love in the room for this most personable and positive of young American designers, and there were pieces in this collection for a broad demographic of Preston followers to cherish.
19 June 2019
When Heron Preston started preparing his Fall collection—which was inspired by, of all things, the Transportation Security Administration’s Instagram feed—he could not have known that that particular branch of civic employment would be disrupted by the ongoing partial government shutdown in the U.S. It was a coincidence, of course, but evidence all the same that Preston is rarely off-the-moment. The fact that his thinking began on social media—where arguably 99 percent of his fanbase lives and breathes—makes it all the more telling that he’s still one to watch.That said, one got the sense that Preston was a little unsteady with Fall’s vision, and in that, some of the clothes became watered-down versions of stuff he’s done—better—in the past. The Cyrillic character logo for “style” feels—to the critical eye—played out at this point, and it was implemented frequently in this lineup. It may function as an ostensible semaphore for the brand, but Preston might consider moving on, and using more of his just-as-recognizable signature orange-tab logo. Another example: Last season’s workwear jackets were assertive and charismatic. Fall’s were plainer and less authoritative than what Preston is very capable of doing.Where there were newer prospects, the designer cleared security and took off—the use of upcycled military-grade parachute nylon in outerwear, nicely done knit jumpers, and a collaboration with Nike on a new Huarache style all included. For women, there was a strong two-tone blue faux-fur coat, and equally smart leggings and bike shorts. With his sharp eye, an activewear segment from Preston might be interesting. And congratulations are in order no matter what your opinion: Preston reasserted that his brand is focusing on sustainability going forward and, on top of that, tonight marked his first runway show. “It links to the TSA, in a way,” he said. “I travel so much throughout the year . . . I’m always on runways.”
15 January 2019
A magpie for visuals—or more like a hawk (wait a second for this reference to make sense)—Heron Preston’s Spring collection, dubbed En Vogue, highlighted his continued fascination with kaleidoscopically referenced utilitywear. It was solid. And, it showed some progress; there were here-and-there hints of further elevation, such as with his final two women’s looks: coat dresses in his familiar silver and orange color scheme, which may very well have been the fanciest things Preston has put on a runway. It girls will soon be seen in them.Back to that hawk reference: Preston’s collaboration with NASA, shown last season, hits stores shortly. This time around, he took satellite images of Australia’s scorched outback and applied them to co-ed pants (these looked extra-good when paired with a blocked denim jacket), shorts, and a shirt-jacket. “My Google backgrounds are always different satellite images of the world,” said the designer. So: a bird’s eye view, from a digital perch. It’s a fitting phrase for how on-the-pulse Preston usually is.There are a couple of news items to highlight, too, including the introduction of toolbox hard-sided cases (purses if we’re using finer language), and an update on his recurring Cyrillic font motif, which says “Style,” now in Cantonese. “I’m introducing ‘Style’ in different languages—we have a store opening in Hong Kong later this year.” Lastly, Preston partnered with Nike on new sunglasses (this writer thought the Air Force 1 sneakers used in the show might’ve also been a linkup, but no). “So many people have been doing footwear collabs, but Nike is much bigger than that. When I used to work there, I wore these glasses all the time.” The frame, originally known as the Tailwind when it debuted in 2008, is performance-ready and rakishly shaped. Now called the Tailwind HP, they’ll come with interchangeable lenses, one set of which is Preston’s signature bold tangerine shade.
21 June 2018
It’s hard to argue against the draw of Heron Preston and his thriving, smart take on streetwear. For one, it’s original—a mishmash of ideas that the man somehow funnels into a steady surge of desirability—and, on top of that, it’s borderline oracular. Bella Hadid, wearing his Fall 2018 collection, was snapped by paparazzi en route to Preston’s presentation this evening. The blazer, thediamantesuit beneath, the chunky Dad sneaker; she looked an embodiment of trendiness at this exact moment. Preston is no doubt a part of that pacesetting turbine.A quick story on that jacket: It was a “happy accident.” Preston’s factory ran out of one of the fabrics, and opted to splice it with another. He loved the result, and made it part of the lineup—it will go into production, along with the rest of what was seen tonight.Preston called his collection “Public Figure—it’s about influencer culture, and theexplosionof influencer culture.” From there, it was broken into segments, with men’s and women’s mixed together. To start, he collaborated with NASA—yes, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration—on a capsule of technical outerwear including jackets, sweatpants, and sweatshirts. “I went back with their teams to get the approvals,” said Preston. “There were so many guidelines I had to follow. You can only use a certain color on a certain background. I used what was called the ‘worm’ logo, which was discontinued in 1992. So that’s why, intermittently, you see topstitching that reads ‘Fall/Winter 1990.’” There he tapped on nostalgia, a major theme this season. He even reimagined a retro-jetpack as a three-in-one backpack, fanny pack, and tote bag.He also partnered with Carhartt, adding rhinestone treatments to distressed cargo pieces, while simultaneously revealing terrific new handbags that feature pull-tabs that date back to his original collection; new foliage-print boots; new leather jackets for women; and new eyewear (in aThe Matrix-meets-Wayfarer shape in three hues).Through all that, there shone the mainline roster, rife with graphic tops, faux-fur coats, pajama pants with a cartoon heron print, rugby polos, puffers, and, believe it or not, a hell of a lot more. Syncing back to the “influencer culture” wellspring, one ingenious T-shirt had the places “where influencers seem to see each other all the time” screen-printed across the stomach: Art Basel, Burning Man, the Chateau Marmont, and, of course, Fashion Week.
Some might find it scattershot, but to this writer, it is the subtextual specialization and the something-for-everyone-ness that makes Preston intriguing, even if there are continuities from season to season (there’s nothing wrong with a carryover). There has been a rise in fashion’s dialogue about the power of niche product, and under his proverbial bright orange umbrella, this designer knows effectively how to compartmentalize and to execute and edit accordingly so that it all still feels very him. It is, we’d wager, the reason for his success. And his followers are far and wide: A 28-year-old male financier friend from New York DM’ed to say, “Big Preston fan.” And, at the presentation, as Hadid entered wearing that blazer, she said: “It worked out! Thanks, man. I’m so happy.” Preston should be, too.
17 January 2018
The big news from Heron Preston today: womenswear! This young designer, who only debuted his first full menswear collection for Fall, said he’s introducing 50 pieces for women this Spring. The move is sensical—Preston has become very popular very quickly, and his stuff has been worn by the likes of Bella Hadid and co. (Hadid, as it happens, made an appearance at Preston’s presentation this evening.)Combined, he called his Spring lineup “Show House.” “When I was little,” he said, “my parents moved out of San Francisco, up to the suburbs, to a new housing development. Before you go, they have these model homes—the interior decoration is super cheesy, like there’s a bowl of fruit glued to the table and there’s kitschy art on the wall, like a kitten playing or, I don’t know, trees blowing in the wind. I looked at cheesy graphics, basically.”He didn’t get myArrested Developmentreference, but so what? Preston plays to a younger, thick-of-it millennial crowd that can’t seem to get enough of him, and today was a testament to what he does well. That “cheesy” element he spoke of was grated onto street-chic things like a hoodie with random prints of a snake and an exploding baseball (lifted off a printing shop’s aging sample, seen in the window of its Midtown Manhattan home), or a cartoon-y kitten with the word “angel” underneath it on a jumper. Preston called it “kitschy,” but the chintzy vibes were offset by his signatures, which wereeverywhere(perhaps almost overly so): John James Audubon imagery (nicely applied in one example on a see-through plastic raincoat for the boys), the Cyrillic word for style, and his signature warning-cone orange tag.For men, the total picture wasn’t majorly evolved, though he did offer some sharper, dressier bits like policeman pants inspired by the trousers worn by Italian cops. For women, the look was racier—there were more transparencies, more crops, and a kind of new-gen sexiness that isn’t so much about the stereotypical tenets of the word, but the Insta-glam adaptation of it. Think: a little gothic, showy, confident, and sort of weird. Kind of like what Bella Hadid always wears.Preston is also introducing handbags made in collaboration with Virgil Abloh’s Off-White, and his line with New York’s Department of Sanitation continues. He’s a busy man, but his vision is consistent and committed. Consider this “Show House” sold.
22 June 2017
This men’s season has brought back—or rather, maybe, sustained—the question of: What is modern streetwear’s place in “fashion?” Is it here to stay? Is it worthy of being ranked alongside established legacies? This writer is in the camp of: hell, yes. Louis Vuitton and Supreme brought that flame, which was still burning at a lower heat, roaring back to life. In as much as a men’s Fashion Week show could, that drop broke the Internet. Merch-y fashion thrives, like Dolce & Gabbana’s printed dresses or Gucci’s intarsia sweaters (or, maybe, Balenciaga’s Bernie Sanders puffers). Fashion-y merch also reigns, like Palace’s tees or, now, Supreme’s Keepall Vuitton duffels, for which there are reportedly already waiting lists. And while we’ve witnessed a general tendency to move toward more formal codes, those who are keeping things casual are still impressing, still tapping the zeitgeist. One such player is Heron Preston, who debuted his first eponymous collection this evening in Paris, and whose label is under the New Guards Group parent company—the same that holds Off-White, Palm Angels, and more.Preston officially landed on the calendar last season, in New York, when he presented a collaboration rendered with New York City’s Department of Sanitation. A portion of that endeavor will continue in his namesake collection, including T-shirts and reflective-material bags. “Everything, now, is made in Italy, though,” Preston said. “The first collection was done mainly with upcycled and donated pieces from sanitation workers. That’s hard to scale.” But, even though he has turned to internally producing all of his product, he says he’s endeavoring to keep his carbon footprint down—“I’m not totally green, I just want to bebetter.”That the grassroots-y DSNY partnership bloomed into a full line, replete with signatures of other material he has released over the years as a DJ and general purpose creative director (like turtlenecks with “STYLE” written in Cyrillic along the neck), seems only natural; Preston is very popular, but his build-out doesn’t feel hurried. And the slow burn simmered tonight; there was something pleasingly forthright about a padded blue bomber jacket with a great blue heron (get it?) embroidered at the sleeve, or aDuck Dynasty–foliage hoodie with the above-mentioned verbiage ringing its hemline.
Utilitarian pants had airflow zips, belting boasted ripcords, and the collection’s title text, “For You, The World,” was lit up in neon airbrushing on the backs of tops. The personal bittiness of this lineup gave it its authenticity. Combined with his functional lean, it is what differentiates this atypical designer from the streetwear flock, and what, in turn, legitimizes him—Heron Preston is real.
20 January 2017