With even more black than last season, the details in this Hyke outing were somewhat hard to make out against the black curtain in the lookbook imagery, but it was a collection that nonetheless included plenty to admire up close.
As usual, Hideaki Yoshihara and Yukiko Ode—who in their pre-Hyke days ran a vintage clothing store together—riffed on old workwear, teasing out contemporary clothing from styles that were sometimes a century old. Highlights included a CCC (that’s Civilian Conservation Corps) logger jacket, originally designed for forestry workers in the States, that had been updated in tactile wool and a technical-looking fabric, and a CPO (Chief Petty Officer) jacket shagged out in alpaca wool. And that was just the acronym-able pieces. Another great moment came in the Fair Isle pattern in the sweaters—clasp cardigans and neck gaiters—that turned out to be a reinterpretation of a favorite Nordic sweater of Ode’s, the subtle frills at the shoulder exemplary of the chic, feminine twist the label is known for. “Every season is an evolution of the same concept, but we want it to be different every time,” said Yoshihara. “We rely on our intuition to update it.”
As well as a geeky attention to vintage styles and technical fabrics, Hyke always seems to have an intriguing raft of collaborations going on. This season these included some leather ankle boots and loafers with the aptly named Beautiful Shoes, and some studious-looking specs from Eyevan. The most notable, though, was with Eddie Bauer, perhaps because it played to the duo’s superpower of breathing new life into old clothes. Among a couple of down pieces, the collaboration included a reinterpretation of Eddie Bauer’s 1936 Skyliner Jacket—the first down jacket ever patented in America.
Despite the historical references Ode and Yoshihara enjoy, they consistently excel in making everything look right for the moment by boldly playing with silhouette and volume. See the double-breasted jackets cropped high at the waist and styled with roomy tailored trousers, and the blue chambray button-up shirt that cascaded elegantly down to the ankles. Generations from now, another couple of vintage otakus may well be reinterpreting Hyke’s own archive for themselves.
