Michael Bastian's work is about a rarefied, almost romantic, sense of masculinity, one that perhaps only exists in the Technicolor world of film. As the violin strains of a classical cover of Roxette's "Listen to your Heart" began, from student to boxer, from mechanic to ranch-hand, Bastian explored the archetype of the American male, doing so under the lens of a 1950s James Dean aesthetic -- literally and figuratively, as some of the eyeglasses in the show were the same models worn by Dean in the 1950s. The more formal pieces were framed within a woodsman context -- with double-breasted dinner-jackets paired with plaid trousers, and plaid day-jackets matched with raw denim jeans, the only thing missing was an axe with which to chop down trees. Particular strong points included a grey double-belted pant, and a powder blue dinner jacket with a black shawl-collar. There was, at tim es, a very collegiate feel to the collection, though these boffinish undertones of seersucker corduroy blazers and rugby-shirts-on-polo-shirts don't in any way detract from the strength of the Bastian's ideal male. To Bastian, inside all of us, there is a rebel -- one that needn't have a cause except to be very well dressed.
PAPERMAG's Complete Spring 2012 Fashion Coverage
