Matthew M Williams’s First Men’s Show For Givenchy S/S'23

British Vogue’s fashion critic Anders Christian Madsen shares five key takeaways from Givenchy’s menswear spring/summer 2023 presentation in Paris.

Givenchy is spotlighting its menswear

Matthew M Williams joined Givenchy as creative director during the pandemic, and had to spend the first seasons at the house delivering presentations to a digital audience. When he finally got to put on his first show last year – mixing women’s and menswear – he came at the live format with the dimensions of a stadium concert. This season marked his first standalone men’s show: testament, no doubt, to the fact that the urban wardrobe Williams believes in at Givenchy is resonating with a male audience, but also to the fact that clothes like these – elevated workwear from denim trousers to leather jackets and hoodies – represent an essential contemporary wardrobe coveted by all genders.

It was about real clothes and covetable accessories

“It’s a dialogue with the time and culture that shape the way men dress today and tomorrow: the way new generations embrace and evolve the archetypes and dress codes of the past through their own progressive outlook,” Williams said. “It’s a thrilling evolution and the reason I have chosen this moment to stage a standalone men’s show for Givenchy.” The collection identified the clothes we wear the most: real, everyday staples like blousons, gilets, cargo trousers, hoodies and T-shirts, but interpreted through the Parisian craftsmanship of Givenchy’s expert ateliers. He styled it with the accessories that trademark his Givenchy look: iterations on the all-knitted TK-360 trainers, his big backpacks, and an angular new sunglass design called the G-Cut.

It was urban-wear through a couture lens

The show opened with a series of leather jackets over-embroidered with motifs that included a replica of a tarot card tattoo Williams carries on his leg. Among his most painstaking artisanal expressions were a jacket and a pair of shorts patchworked from upcycled scraps from the Givenchy leather factories, which had been laminated for a rigid, super luxe look. Shell jackets that looked like nylon were actually constructed from lightweight leather, while the camouflage of the highly textured pieces that closed the show was created from logo jacquard overlaid with laser-cut muslin, which had been meticulously destroyed by way of sanding for hours, by hand.

It featured an Alkaline soundtrack

The show took place on the grounds of the École Militaire where Williams had erected a large, white futuristic box surrounded by a moat of milky water with fog hovering in the air. He devoted his soundtrack to Alkaline, the Jamaican-born dancehall and reggae artists whose signature black contact lenses and rugged, industrial dress sense had caught Williams’s attention. As illustrated on Instagram, where posts from the show attracted endless likes and comments from Alkaline’s young but very diehard fanbase, this presence bore witness to Williams’s talent for snapping up artists, who are about to get seriously big, and welcoming them into the Givenchy family.

Williams is his own best muse

“Menswear was, quite naturally, the way I discovered fashion. In my practice at Givenchy, my men’s collections continue to be founded in an instinctive point of departure. This show is a reflection of myself and the men who surround me, from my close friends to the artists who inspire my work,” Williams said. When he came out for his bow dressed in black cargo trousers, a black T-shirt and his chunky trainers, you could see the personal approach. At Givenchy, Williams is creating a men’s wardrobe he believes in, because it’s exactly the type of fashion he has spent his life shopping for, himself.