H&M (Q4527)
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Swedish multinational clothing-retail company
- H & M Hennes & Mauritz AB
- H & M
- H and M
- Hennes & Mauritz
- Hm
| Language | Label | Description | Also known as |
|---|---|---|---|
| English | H&M |
Swedish multinational clothing-retail company |
|
Statements
2012
collaborator
model
2015
Creative Advisor
2017
collaborator
Pop is the music genre most associated with Sweden, but Ann-Sofie Johansson and team were tuned into jazz when they created H&M Studio’s fall 2024 collection. Their focus was less the music than its makers, however. Legends like Thelonius Monk, Billie Holiday, Miles Davis; artists whose style was as unique as their sound. One of their key references wasBut Beautiful: A Book About Jazzby Geoff Dyer; in Italy, the designers discovered a repair shop for antique brass instruments, and brought home some relics, which ended up informing the sunglass and jewelry designs.Recent H&M Studio collections and collaborations, such as with Paco Rabanne’s Julien Dossena, have emphasized holiday dressing, and this collection doesn’t disappoint in that area. Hitting the highest, brightest note is a set (or perhaps, one should day duet?) consisting of a Terri Lyne (as in Carrington) T-shirt top and long Benny (as in Goodman) skirt of sparkling silver sequins. Flirtier, and shorter is an LBD sheath with sheer inserts from neck to bust and at the edge of a hem, and a wool and Tencel dress with boning that creates an hourglass shape. Simply elegant is the Simone dress (the opening look), a long black turtleneck column of Eco-Filament Viscose and Spandex with a cut-out back.Tailored looks in gray and black are made for work and play on a quotidian scale. There’s a borrowed from the boys feeling to an oversize, but precisely tailored, checked wool-blend jacket and miniskirt. Boxier is a pantsuit. The double-breasted Nat King blazer has horizontal pockets on either side of the lapels. A tracksuit jacket with built-up shoulders has a power look, in contrast to the luxe, softness of the Billie shearling jacket that ties with a slim cord at the waist. Print comes into play via a color-blocked dress (white polka dots on black and pink polka dots on black) with a pussy-bow neckline and flou built into the full skirt. Surely headed for the top of the charts in the collection’s Thelonius coat. A water-repellent recycled nylon with a robe silhouette, it features a blown-up photo-print of leopard spots leaning into the “cool cat” aspects of jazz style and also plays with ideas of status. Back in the day, suggested H&M Studio designer Linda Wikell on a walk-through in Stockholm, “symbols of success” might include a fancy car, a strand of pearls or a mink coat; costly luxury items. This super-sized puffer blows up the idea that to look like a million, you have to spend as much.
19 September 2024
H&M Studio’s proposition for spring 2024 is desk-to-desert, rather than desk-to-dinner dressing. Options for the latter do exist within the collection, but overall the idea is getting away from it all. “The dreaming of traveling… is really something that can free your mind; it’s liberating in that sense,” said Ann-Sofie Johansson, the company’s creative advisor. Some of the looks in the lineup would make for suitable music festival fare, but the vibe, which was inspired by Lana del Rey, was tinged with a bit of melancholy. Also in the mix: Jack Kerouac and Zabriskie Point, the Death Valley location made famous by the Michelangelo Antonioni movie of the 1970 same name.This collection is less geared toward partying than the past few have been. For spring, the team explored the 1970s moment when separates and soft dressing emerged, as well as the “long and lean silhouette” that Johansson finds so attractive. Several of these strands came together in a stretchy maxi dress with tucks gathered into a half-circle inset at one side (resembling the sun). It would look smashing paired with a sky-blue leather midi coat; both aim to capture the desert sky at different times of day. Ease was also worked into roomy tailoring. A modish python-print mini-shift with a deep neckline took things in a sharper direction.The jeans offering included a washed denim shirt and jeans. The latter have the slightly higher waist and flared legs that ABBA preferred, back in the day. It just so happens that 2024 marks the 50th anniversary of the Swedish group’s “Waterloo” Eurovision win.
1 February 2024
The first thing my eye fell upon when walking into the studio space where the H&M Studio collection was presented was a short black dress with square shoulders and white collar and cuffs. The look, a mashup of Wednesday Addams and Frankenstein, was unexpectedly sophisticated. Indeed this iteration of the Studio line is one of the most grown-up and dressy the team has shown to date with a good balance between minimal tailoring, especially in the form of a long coat, and sparkly party attire.Studio always has “glamorous, more exuberant pieces; we always have tailoring, and we always have big chunky jewelry accessories,” noted company creative advisor Ann-Sofie Johansson. Still, the vibe was elevated and there was a sense of change in the air. It turns out this collection is indeed a harbinger of evolution: “We are trying to build Studio as a brand within [a brand],” Johansson noted. Though it will continue to be a capsule-like venture, the focus going forward will tend more toward the timeless than trendy.There were options for work and play here, and many of the garments, like an of-the-moment black midiskirt, could go either way. An emo tear-print and diamante-studded denim looked extroverted, in contrast to the lace-trimmed lady blouse, which could be worn with or without irony. But that these disparate pieces can coexist within this small collection is a testament to the clear vision behind it.
16 August 2023
The cult of personality... It delivers dramas and looks, and it has done through the ages. Hollywood has a lot to do with it, of course, and the recent Elvis and Marilyn Monroe movies seem to have sparked a desire for throwback glamour. That’s how Ann-Sofie Johansson sees it. The H&M Studio collection she designed for spring 2023 responds to that with a collection illuminated by the star wattage of Grammy-winning artist Kali Uchis.The offering is much broader than what is depicted in the lookbook, and includes a keeper of a leather jacket (with a whiff of Brando) in distressed brown leather to pair with jeans or one of the tulle ball skirts in the lineup. Greta Garbo wore a trenchcoat to pass under the radar, and Uchi wears H&M Studio’s update, featuring exaggerated shoulders and an outsized collar. The black set the singer sports elsewhere is embroidered with shiny buttons made from post-consumer recycled plastic sorted in Bengaluru, India, as part of an initiative the H&M Group has with the social enterprise Hasiru Dala Innovations.A trompe l’oeil drapery print puts some fun into tailoring while pulling back the curtain on some of the underlying themes of the collection, such as person-versus-persona and real-versus-fake, which the team translated into on- and off-duty looks. The challenge, Johansson explains, is to “make really spectacular dresses and skirts, but also to keep it real, but still looking like a million dollars.”This being an H&M collection, nothing will approach the seven figure range. The Studio collection might be relatively “accessible” but it’s not meant to be throw-away. If you break it down, the pieces are mostly wardrobe staples, with a few surprises, like vaguely Blond Ambition-style lingerie tops. The direction Johansson sees fashion moving is away from things being constantly new. “I mean, we are not finished with things. We’re not ready to leave things before they are supposed to be gone. So that is why I think we need to continue with certain things.” She’s talking about fashion (garments), but she could just as well be talking about the swell of nostalgia, for everything from Marilyn to Y2K, that keeps fashion fastened to what has been. The casting of Uchis helps bring a new perspective to a familiar theme.
8 February 2023
Watch out Elon Musk, H&M is calling dibs on Mars with a Studio collection that takes the idea of post-COVID escapism to extremes. “We talked so much about the new reality and how to dress for the future,” explained Ann-Sofie Johansson on a call from Stockholm. Is Mars a new utopia? Are we going to live there? And is that actually an option? These were some rhetorical questions the team tackled as they considered future dressing. Cue glitter boots meant to resemble moon dust and an asymmetric silver dress, which referenced the retro-futurism of space-age designers like André Courrèges and Paco Rabanne and, more recently, Loewe.These celestial disco looks were balanced by attention-grabbing neons. Some, like a wired organza top and nylon pants, were made using deliberately airy fabrics, as if to reference the zero-gravity aspect of space. In contrast, more substantial materials were used on protective garments like a pink oversized windbreaker and cuddly turquoise fleece. Comfort, it seems, is a nonnegotiable for earthlings wherever they may be.
1 September 2022
“Shrek” green, fanta orange, leopard spots, diamanté, and metal studs come together for maximum impact in H&M Studio’s new collection. This bi-annual offering is a kind of playground for the brand’s in-house designers, who really let loose, blurring references from the ’80s, ’90s, and ’00s into the stuff of street style fantasy.This season the team was chasing a mood, rather than following a narrative. Ann-Sofie Johansson, H&M’s creative advisor, explained that a vintage in-house ad talking about “super fashion” was the jumping off point for such pieces as a studded denim micro-mini and matching jacket, a racy printed maillot (styled for the street), and a satin set with a cowboy vibe that was very much in the vein of Madonna’s 2000 Music moment. For those looking for what Johansson describes as a more “pulled together” 1980s look, there is gray suiting, with longer jackets and strong shoulders. This anything-goes-as-long-as-it’s-glam collection feels like a sugar rush, focused not on the long term, but on quick satisfaction.
9 February 2022
H&M Studio has existed for years as a space for experimentation within the huge Hennes & Mauritz empire. It’s a playground for experimentation, a place where in-house designers can flex their muscles and create fashion-forward items. This pushing of boundaries extends beyond aesthetics to formats. H&M Studio has shown on the Paris schedule, hosted influencer events, and currently presents two see-now, buy-now collections a year.The spring 2021 lineup is laced with fantasy. There’s a pirate hat and over-the-knee boots made of grape leather. Fringed dresses inspired by the tentacles of octopuses, oversized blazers, and wide-leg sailor pants. “We were talking about treasures and treasure seeking,” said Ann-Sofie Johansson, H&M’s creative advisor “and finding magic and adventure in the everyday. I mean, fashion is so much about fantasy and magic, and we wanted to capture that.”Top and sandals from the spring 2021 Studio collection, with vintage leather pants from the fall 2013 Studio linePhoto: Courtesy of H&M StudioVintage broderie anglaise shorts from spring 2017, styled with a blazer and shirt from the spring 2021 Studio collectionPhoto: Courtesy of H&M StudioLooking for magic, many on the team found it in pieces from past Studio collections. There was talk of doing a best-of, sort-of theme, but that evolved into a multilayered experiment around upcycling, a sort of dip of the toe into the burgeoning resale market.Here’s what happened. An email went out to all H&M colleagues asking for old studio garments. This “haul” will be available for sale in two stores, one in Stockholm and one in Berlin. On top of that H&M has invested in and partnered with Selpy, an online Swedish resale business, and in four countries a curated collection of vintage H&M Studio garments will be available.The motivation behind this “tryout” is clear: “We need to be circular [and] we know that a big piece of that is reuse,” says Johansson. “It’s a matter of seeing every garment as [if] it doesn’t just have one life, [but] it has maybe nine lives—like a cat.”
10 February 2021
H&M staged its annual see-now-buy-now Spring show in Paris tonight amid the city’s Fall presentations. With Japan as the starting point of the collection, one of the grand halls of the Musée des Arts Décoratifs was converted into a giantryokan, complete with mega paper lanterns, tatami mats, and geta socks for hundreds. A dinner of sushi, sashimi, miso soup, and little bites was served, and sake flowed, although, not quite fast enough. The Dancing Strawhatz, a performance trio from Japan who appear completely masked, did a short dance, and paper cherry blossoms fell from the ceiling at the finale.After all that, would you believe that the clothes barely read as Japanese at all? Well, they didn’t, and that’s probably not a bad thing. Last month, H&M issued a public apology after its online advertisement featuring a black boy modeling a sweatshirt reading “coolest monkey in the jungle” prompted outrage for its blatant racism. A literal reading of traditional Japanese clothing could’ve proved problematic. As it was, bright graphic prints and tone-on-tone jacquards were modeled after Japanese katakana, but the alphabet was so abstracted, the reference point wasn’t immediately apparent. “We tried to keep it conceptual,” said Andreas Lowenstam, who heads up menswear. This was a mostly minimal show with shades of Céline and nods to current trends like the poncho, flares, and fringe, both silk and crystal.It was also a feel-good show, and what that boiled down to was the models’ smiles. Joan Smalls and Winnie Harlow whooped and hollered for Yasmin Wijnaldum as she sauntered by, and when Adwoa Aboah rounded the bend of the celebrities’ table, she high-fived someone. Was it the older brother fromStranger Things? Ruth Wilson? From where we were sitting, we couldn’t be sure. “We told them, ‘We’re H&M, you have to smile,’ ” said head of design and creative director Pernilla Wohlfahrt. Why other designers don’t encourage the same is one of fashion’s most persistent (and sad) mysteries.
28 February 2018
Behind the runway made of reclaimed pine floorboards that creaked as you walked on them were two cash tills and some rails full of the looks at tonight’s H&M Studio collection. Just as at Tommy Hilfiger in L.A. recently, this was see-now-buy-now made real-world as well as digital.Pre-show, an audience of maybe 600 that included Nicki Minaj and Olga Kurylenko lingered long beyond the advertised start time and drank delicious cocktails mixed by London’s Cellar Society. As guests quaffed, H&M’s creative advisor Ann-Sofie Johansson kindly shared a browse down those rails to check a collection that mixed ’70s-touched Victoriana with Barrecor-flavored athleisure: the Studio team had traveled to Cuba for inspiration for the collection and had become interested in a local ballet school. Alongside a screen showing Gigi Hadid’s look—containing Gigi, Gigi-ing at various angles—hung various sizes of her black cotton shirt with strapping and scalloping at the cuff, crushed black nylon bloomers with more straps, and a lace bralet.This was the first H&M Studio collection to feature menswear, and its charming masculine head honcho Andreas Löwenstam was in situ, inspecting the nylon trenches and wide-waistbanded pants that were soon to be marched out on that pine accompanied by game audience engagement from the models. Given that within the grand span of the brand this limited collection would generate a mere grain of revenue—and imply significant cost (just check the guestlist, the castlist, plus The Weeknd on the video), what was its chief value? Said Johansson: “The value is of course that it is building the brand. And we can focus on our design team, to show what we can do within the house and that we have so many clever people. And it is fun of course.”And it was! There is an inherent lack of suspense in a show like this—especially if your gig is to review it—because this really is just a form of streamed ceremony about as real asReal Housewives. But the Victoriana-meets-athleisure theme worked fine, as did the integration of menswear. There was a lot oflovewritten on the clothes, and they were sometimes pretty lovable. Plus the cottons, Johansson said, were organic: How amazing would it be if H&M extended that sourcing across its whole business? By the time The Weeknd bounced out in his $129 monochrome jacquard bomber to sing as the models closed the show and then coalesced in a hilarious cluster of for-camera dancing—awkward—nobody was feeling any pain.
Earlier, the producers had played a cover of “Grease” which contains lines that seem especially extra-relevant to fashion right now: “This is a life of illusion, a life of control / Mixed with confusion—what are we doing here?”
1 March 2017
Ann-Sofie Johansson noted before this fourth H&M Studio show that the see-now-buy-now convulsions gripping fashion this season had not gone unnoticed in Stockholm—and might lead to changes for this collection’s presentation. H&M’s head of design said, “I think we will change the format, you know. I think we will in the future. It’s just a matter of seeing how you do it.” It’s ironic—and a touch meta—when the figurehead slow-fashion collection of one of the world’s top two fast-fashion retailers has to react to traditional slow fashion’s reaction to fast fashion.Originally conceived as a platform for H&M designers to showcase their expertise outside the arena of constant retail drops, this show was also a masterfully wrangled hype generator. Shown in the former Paris commodities exchange building (made obsolete in the ’80s by computer trading), beneath gorgeous frescoes of international exchange by ocean-going sail ships, this was a perfect Insta-storm. Celebrities includedKate Mara,Ciara,Emma Roberts,Suki Waterhouse, Atlanta de Cadenet Taylor, and many others listed on the nine-names-to-a-page, thickly sheaved handout. Along with high-follower Insta-influencers, they sat on four white upholsteries in the middle of the floor, which had been specially laid with black marble-effect covering. To the uplifting incantations of a 30-ish strong choir, a famous and quite diverse (at least in terms of fashion) cast of models did their thing: Ashley Graham, Andreja Pejic, Pat Cleveland (who walks like she’s belly dancing, just amazingly),Amber Valletta, Natasha Poly, andJourdan Dunnwere just a few of them.The clothes, you could almost posit, were secondary—although between 40 and 50 of the pieces shown here will appear in-store at H&M in September. Johansson and her team incorporated embroidered motifs and florals from Swedish folk dress and the disassembled natural camouflage of (Swedish predator) Lynx pattern on velvet hoodies, dresses, and wide pants in some of the best looks here. The three-quarter-sleeved coat—to better allow shirt-flashing—was a fun enough theme, and near the close, there were some fine inversions of the lace accented pin-striped power suit section earlier via silver metallic and bead details on blue velvet eveningwear. The addition of gaucho hats and cowboy boots in snake print leather and suede was perhaps a touch de trop, especially as the idea of H&M focusing on its Swedishness was so promising.
Three nasty falls at the finale also demonstrated the inadvisability of box-fresh cowboy heels on fake marble flooring.
2 March 2016
H&M's head of design, Ann-Sofie Johansson, deserves props for landing on one of Fall's biggest themes: the moon. Actually, it's stars that have captured fashion's interest at the moment (see Emilio Pucci, Anthony Vaccarello), but close enough. H&M is a big-box chain historically known for following the runway trends. Things are so head-spinningly super-paced at the current moment that regular old fashion and fast fashion are colliding.To start today's show, Caroline de Maigret, the Parisian street-style fixture and music producer, hit the runway in a silver leather flight suit. After zapping the audience with her radio, she entered her space-pod-cum-DJ-booth and began playing tunes. As the models emerged, it became clear that H&M's new Fall collection wasn't as far-out as the moonscape runway might have led us all to believe. Outerwear was padded and quilted, but the colors were positively earthy, and while there was something celestial about the graphic prints, the tailored jackets and pants they turned up on looked familiar. If we had to guess, we'd say the H&M customer will be most interested in the chunky ribbed sweaters and the ski-pants-slash-leather-salopettesthey were worn with. Those and the knee-high lace-up Moon Boots.After the models' finale lap, the space pods opened amid much steam, each one stocked with champagne on ice and a very patient, and probably quite sweaty, bartender. "Best show ever" was overheard, as someone swigged a quick glass. Not quite. But with Caroline, Kendall, Gigi, Joan, and Edie in the ranks, it did qualify as one of the most stellar castings of the season. And the really remarkable thing? They were all smiling.
4 March 2015