3.1 Phillip Lim (Q7817)
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3.1 Phillip Lim is a fashion house from BOF.
- 3 1 Phillip Lim
| Language | Label | Description | Also known as |
|---|---|---|---|
| English | 3.1 Phillip Lim |
3.1 Phillip Lim is a fashion house from BOF. |
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Statements
Phillip Lim’s show was a celebration of his 20 years in business. Looking around the room, just a small fraction of us were there for his start. Fashion is a notoriously challenging industry based on change. Most of Lim’s contemporaries from his mid-2000s beginnings have quietly slipped off of Vogue Runway’s review grid, victims of financial difficulties, too few ideas, or some other random problem. How does it feel to be one of the survivors? Backstage Lim used one word: joyful.The secret to Lim’s success is his eye for changing trends and his ability to incorporate them into his own brand vocabulary—his adaptability, you could say. So it was somewhat surprising to learn, on being told that he had used the color of the moment, that he was unfamiliar with the phenomenon of brat green. “It’s a color I wore in California when I was young,” he said by way of explanation. In any case, it appeared on a cool pair of loose-fitting jeans with zips down the sides that could get a girl out of her true blues.His vocabulary is strong. I recognized the rosettes from a spring 2007 collection, his first-ever runway show way back when. Other callbacks included lace tops with football jersey proportions, the crystal fringe numbers, and all the hybrids, like denim spliced with sweats and patched with camouflage, and “mantra” T-shirts that morphed into slip dresses. But Lim also tried new things, like taking up the length of skirts for a couple of micro wrap skirts and an acid-washed denim mini.Pressed for feelings about the milestone, Lim offered up words that felt rather like something he could print on one of those tees: “It feels like I can only guarantee the moment.” Fashion, he said, “comes and goes; lengths, colors change. But joy is a human quality we can all tap into, we can all share. And right now, at this time in particular, joy is so necessary.” That was the wisdom of experience talking, then he put it into action when he invited his studio team out with him to take a 20th anniversary bow.
8 September 2024
Inevitably, the crisis in retailing has been a subject of this resort season. How could it not be? Many designers are owed money, and if they aren’t they know someone who is. But if designers are uneasy, the thoughtful collections they’re producing don’t show it. I keep hearing versions of what Phillip Lim said during a visit to his Great Jones Street store: “We’re digging into who we are and doing that.”Lim’s New York brand is turning 20, which makes him a sort of high elder of the high contemporary market, where trend-driven brands seem to come and go with increasing rapidity. Trend cycles now are stupidly fast, as anyone who pays glancing attention to TikTok can tell you, but social media and clothing production operate on different time frames; one can’t keep up with the other. At our appointment, Lim exuded an appealing sense of calm; he’s unbothered by the chase.With two decades under his belt, he has plenty to dig into. Lim was an early pioneer of the two-in-one dress (an all-in-oner that looks like a sweater over a skirt), and he brought it back here. It’s no longer a novelty, but this season’s update has the same polished but easy feeling that many women are after. Working from the other angle, he gave acid-wash denim an elevated look, cutting it into high-waisted cargos or splicing it with either lightweight tweed or sweatshirting fabric to create clever hybrids. He called the short-sleeved “boy” shirt tucked into belted and pleated trousers a suit alternative; it would make for a perfect office uniform. “I look at the clothes and ask myself, ‘how is it additive to her life?’ he explained.
12 June 2024
“How do you make the clothes a bit smarter?” As a designer of contemporary fashion that’s aspirational but not unattainable (as opposed to high luxury brands whose current prices give pause to even the most diehard of shoppers), Phillip Lim has made it a policy to build ingenuity into his clothes. His striped ribbed knit midi dress, for example, is entirely reversible, increasing its versatility and lowering its cost-per-wear.Lim was back on the runway last season, but instead of a fashion show today, he organized an immersive presentation that will be open to the public all weekend long featuring his new designs and the work of other AAPI creators. There’s a photo and video installation by his frequent collaborator Jiro Konami, and free-for-the-taking posters of poems by young Asian writers on the themes of live, work, play, and love. “We wanted to make a collection that really encompasses and hopefully resonates with our women in every setting,” he said, making a connection between the poems and his own output.Lim’s idea was to erase distinctions between work clothes and play clothes. This already more or less happens on the street: You see women tossing a statement coat over their workout leggings, pairing ankle boots with tracksuits, or wearing a denim skirt reconstructed from vintage jeans. Lim has a good feel for the dressed-up-yet-casual attitude of downtown New York. A sweat suit that combined French terry and cotton twill and a sergeant’s jacket and cargo pants combo that could stand in for a traditional tailored suit at the office were a couple of the clever ways he channeled those vibes here.
9 February 2024
Phillip Lim was back on the runway in September for the first time in four years, with a collection that blended polish and utility in a way that seems particularly of New York. Denim in anything-but-your-average shapes, boxy men’s button-downs and slips, leggings with fold-over waistbands topped by midriff-baring shirts—running a business out of Great Jones Street, Lim has a good sense for the special-but-not-precious kind of clothes that work here. We’re not running around in stilettos, even if TV shows would have non-New Yorkers believe it.Pre-fall picks up where that show left off. It’s a collection of urban fundamentals: essentials, but not basic. One of his suits, in a nubby linen-wool blend, comes with shorts, not trousers; another, in a technical stretch viscose, features a short sleeved, safari-backed jacket. There are two jean jackets in the lookbook; one is collarless, the other is spliced with a sharp-cut blazer. And the dresses that look like two-piece sweater and slip sets are in fact easy-on one-and-dones.“Pre-fall, for me, it’s like back-to-school,” he said at a preview in his store. Looking for wardrobe updates, his customers might be attracted to a car coat with curved seaming that gives it a generous shape; it registers high on the utility scale. A midi-dress in a patchwork of floral prints reads more whimsical, but it’s hardly an on-a-whim kind of thing; it would come in especially handy on the hottest days of the summer. The shoe of the season is an asymmetric toe ballerina with a little block heel, fun but also functional.
15 December 2023
Phillip Lim was holding back tears before his show. It’s been four years since he put his collection on a New York runway, and his return had him feeling emotional. The pandemic was especially hard on independent brands like 3.1, but Lim persevered. He came to be one of American fashion’s most outspoken voices about the rising tide of anti-Asian violence during COVID. Fashionwise, he pivoted for a time to the kind of homewear we were all sporting during the lockdown, scaled back his ready-to-wear collections, and thought hard about what makes his brand unique. He grew up in California, but it’s 3.1’s New York bona fides that he opted to emphasize over the past couple of seasons. Awkwafina and Sherry Cola were in the front row wearing 3.1 sweatshirts that splice the brand logo with NYC landmarks.Today’s show was a chance to double down on 3.1’s New York–iness and Lim’s Asian American identity while reacquainting the fashion crowd with what he’s good at: American sportswear with a twist. It came in the form of smart, extra-wide-leg khakis and denim jackets cut in unconventional ways; in breezy scarf dresses whose graphic patterns were inspired by NYC architectural details; and in pajama sets studded playfully with crystals. It was also there in Lim’s nod to the omnipresence of workout gear on the streets; his leggings are cropped below the knee, with a deep folded-over waistline that elevates them above the gym.The surprise was in the abundance of full-length dresses. As a contemporary designer, eveningwear is a category that Lim has never really emphasized, but the options that came down the runway demonstrated that he has an interesting point of view on the subject. Whether in black gauze ruched through the bodice or a lush floral print that faded out north of the hem, there was nothing stuffy or uptight about his special-occasion dresses. That goes for the whole collection. Watching some of this week’s shows, it’s been hard to see the connection between what’s coming down the runway and real life, which can leave you feeling cold. Lim doesn’t have that problem. It’s good to have him back.
10 September 2023
Phillip Lim has plans to return to the runway in September. Though he’s gotten used to low-key fashion weeks in the four years that he’s been showing informally, he’s itching to be part of the action again. In preparation, he called this resort collection a “palate cleanser,” but one that’s based on a concept that’s foundational to the 3.1 brand—uniforms.Not school uniforms or sport uniforms, but art gallerist uniforms. Real-life clothes with high-fashion vibes are Lim’s specialty. Shopping his Great Jones Street store is satisfying because his pieces have the look of now, but without the extra zero on the price tags that you find at higher-end brands.He actually dresses art gallerists, and he’s picked up on a few things: the way they might modify a thrifted jean jacket a couple of sizes too large, how they layer a midi skirt over a pair of trousers that pool at the ankle, their preference for a vintage T-shirt. All of those ideas played out here. His oversize jean jacket is cinched at the back, creating a voluminous blouson shape, and he added a band of lace to a tee declaring “There is only one New York.” For exhibition openings, maybe, there’s a new take on his go-to pouf-sleeved, midi-length dress—a silhouette his fit model has declared the PMA, for “pretty, modern, and appropriate—and, yes, he styled it with long flared pants.But more so than uniforms, New York was Lim’s subject, as it has been for the last few seasons. One sweet example of his affection for the place was a series of pieces in washed black silk appliqued here and there with photo cut-outs of the waxy anthurium flowers sold all over the city at bodegas.
6 June 2023
Phillip Lim has kept a low profile at New York Fashion Week since the pandemic. When you saw him, it was in the front row at his friends’ shows; he’s revealed his own collections via one-on-one appointments in his Great Jones Street store. This season he’s breaking the pattern. Tonight, he’s gathering folks at a pop-up gallery on the Lower East Side for an exhibition of the work of the Japanese photographer Jiro Konami, who takes impressionistic pictures of New York City. Lim gave Konami five pieces from his fall collection and told him to hit the streets. He’ll see the results for the first time when he shows up at his party this evening, but the idea was to channel the impromptu synchronicity that the city is famous for.That’s what he got up to in this collection, as well. A pair of dresses patched from clashing florals and trimmed with Chinatown shopping bag checks are illustrative: The separate parts seem unlikely to mesh, but together they’re surprisingly pleasing. He said he’s been looking at the bookChinatown Pretty, which celebrates the street style of senior citizens across six North American Chinatowns. There’s also an Instagram account, and a scroll-through reveals poh pohs (grandmas) in all manner of offhand, everyday splendor.Among the other mashups here are hoodies made from washed denim, a schoolgirl pinafore with a leather bodice, and puffers with peacoat collars. Lim’s knack for cool outerwear comes across in an oversize washed denim chore jacket and a shrunken leather biker jacket—bikers are trending in these early days of fashion month. There are schoolboy blazers in the mix, too, and he’s developed a 3.1 Phillip Lim crest for the front pockets, the embroidery of which reads: “The City that Never Sleeps.” Lim isn’t likely to get much shut-eye tonight. But gallery hoppers still might spot him over the weekend. The exhibition, at 199 Chrystie Street, is open to the public.
10 February 2023
At the CFDA Awards last month Phillip Lim was on stage with his fellow Slaysians, picking up the organization’s first-ever Positive Social Influence Award. Lim and his friends had been moved by the anti-Asian violence they’d witnessed in New York to create a superhero troupe-slash-support network that fights it by raising visibility about the issue. Lim has also helped launch a GoFundMe to support the AAPI Community Fund that has raised over $7 million to date—no small achievement.At a pre-fall appointment, Lim was talking up his adopted hometown. “This is us putting our pole in the concrete,” he said, “reclaiming who we are as a New York brand and leaning into that.” The collaged t-shirts on which Lady Liberty mingles with NYC logos get the message across loud and clear. Other references are subtler, speaking to how certain New York women dress, with a casual polish that depends on versatility, utility, and accessories.On the versatility front, an MA-1 bomber in shiny navy satin reverses to patchwork denim. And because statement outerwear is essential, even in the hottest months of the year, he cut terrific army jackets with elevating cording details on the pockets. Boots, too, might seem unseasonal to an outsider, but anyone who walks the streets of lower Manhattan knows they’re year-round essentials in these parts. Zippers that extend to the toe-caps and rounded, cushiony soles gave them a distinctive, while still practical spin. A macramé tank dress isn’t an essential, but it proved a useful layering trick here, worn over everything from super-sized pants to a ’90s-ish t-shirt dress. From the grungy ’90s of fuzzy sweaters to the poufed Victorian sleeves of smocked dresses, the mixed bag of references felt true to the spirit of New York.In other news, Lim says he’s crossing his fingers that he’ll be back on the runway by September.
7 December 2022
While showing off a pair of highly wantable white denim pants with a high paper-bag-ish waist and full legs at his Great Jones Street store this morning, Phillip Lim said, “No one needs us to make another pair of jeans; this is denim out of context.”Out of contextis a sort of shorthand for this collection and for Lim’s design philosophy in general. He makes clothes for real life (hence why he left the runway behind three years ago), but there’s usually an element of surprise that elevates his clothes above the everyday. He used the same white denim (and acid-washed shades of pineapple and periwinkle) for lace-edged slip dresses. “At the end of the day it’s a textile; we can design whatever,” he added. French-terry sweatsuit fabric was treated in the same irreverent way for a shoulder-baring top and another with a cutout on the side.Suiting followed the body or came in boyish, oversized proportions, while he used pleated recycled polyester for two dress silhouettes, one with a subtle hourglass shape and the other with a more generous flared volume. He likes to give his clients options, but this offering was smaller than in previous seasons. That’s strategic. “Make less, mean more,” he said, also pointing out the tote bags he had constructed with leftover strips of different colors of leather and weaving from remnant ribbons.Lim had other news today beyond this spring 2023 collection. Those who follow his personal Instagram account learned that he’s been involved behind the scenes on the upcoming Disney+ showAmerican Born Chinese, a genre-bending story based on a graphic novel of the same name that will explore outsider adolescence; he costumed one of its superhero characters. “Genre bending,” he said, “that’s our thing.”
12 September 2022