The Tamesis
The mountains are the moment, and it’s on this terrain that Umit Benan’s fall collection returns to the archetype of masculine elegance, reinventing it through a textured, subtly playful lens. As always, the designers started from a classic idea – the urban man dividing his life between workday tailoring and weekend alpine getaways – but allowed materiality and ease to reinvent it. “For me there’s always a starting image,” Behnam said. “This time it’s a picture of my father in St. Moritz in 1988, wearing all kinds of colors. That’s the man I wanted to bring back, the man who mixed cashmere with mountain goat.”
The novelty comes from the textures, mainly: mélange cashmere, tweed herringbone, silk and wool blends, bouclé-effect wool or washed brown and Bordeaux checks. “I’ve worked a lot on that line this season,” Behnam noted. “It’s not so much inventing shapes as it is mixing touches. Those checks that look almost dusty, those mother-of-pearl buttons—they all remind me of something older, something that once existed but no longer exists.” When the sharpness of the suiting emerged, the fabrics acted as offsets: clothes that looked like bankers’ uniforms from a distance, but up close revealed they were spun from smoother, more feminine fibers.
From urban suits to après-ski sweaters, the silhouettes remain generous and timeless. The “Paradise” capsule collection, focused on luxury mountain pieces, returns with more punch: casual knits in bright colors, silk jackets in alternative colorways, and pieces that feel like weekend gear tossed in the trunk of a car after the office closes. “My idea of mountains is not necessarily technical,” says the designer. “It’s both personal and sporty, and it’s about life moving between two worlds.”
Benin’s man may change cities or climates, but his essence remains the same, like an evergreen, packed weekend bag. If this season has proven anything, it’s that comfort and formality are not opposites, just different registers of the same vocabulary. Furthermore, the presentation format of the brand in the intimate Milan headquarters remains a most valuable experience in the same world, where the clothes can be touched and read like a study of lifestyle luxury goods.
