The Tamesis
Alex Higgins set out to break the habit of organizing collections under a theme. “I wanted to move away from that a little bit and get back to the way things were done before, which was intuitive and emotional,” he said. A man of words – a jumble of words scattered throughout his collection – Higgins stumbled across the phrase “Goodbye Cowboy” while reading Honor Levy’s My First Book. “It’s a very meaningful desire, but also a little pointless and silly,” he points out.
He leaned toward ambiguity, applying a teal-blue sans-serif expression to a gray V-neck sweater layered over a red ruffled collar and paired with surf-inspired printed shorts. It also appeared on T-shirts with clipart lettering, paired with bias-cut skirts in fluted silk chiffon and paired with hats fit for a romantic drifter. Casual shirts and vests were a through line from his early work in gradient stretch fabrics, but in bold sporty primaries. A business shirt and tie paired with oversized cotton shorts. Levy’s book contains ideas about existence in the Internet age and about real and projected identities. Higgins said he wanted to take tropes and make them all into one, so these different elements and dress codes clashed and mixed.
In addition to words, he also focused on symbols. The stars on boxy T-shirts and train skirts might be astrological, patriotic or simply decorative. “I wanted to preserve something for people who come into the store and when they look closely they can see these little snippets of text, but that may not be for everyone.” This intimate relationship with clothing has always been something his followers identify with, especially now that he has his own store in Sydney’s Chinatown.
Higgins describes himself as a pragmatic, business-minded man, so he added black – a color he wasn’t particularly fond of – at the client’s request. This series gives his fans more of what they know with a dash of freshness. At first glance, the pattern could be the underside of a brewing storm cloud, or smoke, or it could actually be a rose. The most important thing for Higgins is that there is always room to make his own decisions.
