If Rag & Bone was once a sprawling garden of jeans and tees, Swaim Hutson is its constant gardener, continuing to prune each season, making room for new growth. Refining, not reinventing, is the name of the game here. Summer, of course, is a tougher season for designers, when consumers want to wear less—a feeling amplified in recent years due to meteorological necessity. “I remember being in Paris, and it was, like, 150 degrees,” Hutson said at the brand’s Meatpacking District showroom, “And thinking: What do I wear?”
Hutson is a cool guy, and you get the sense he lets his intuition and own desires guide his design process. “We’re pushing more elevation, finer fabrications, and in the manufacturing,” he said. “And even though this is high summer, I wanted to feel a little bit—but not totally—dressed up.” The brief to his team was to think of what they would pack in a carry-on for a four-day trip with varied events. “You have to dress up; it could be cooler at night, warmer during the day. How are you dressing?”
The result was lighter fabrications, subtle patterns, and a built-in sense of patina. Take a pair of crisp poplin pants. They came from Hutson’s humble desire for a pair and the frustration that he couldn’t find any to his liking; his came in pajama stripes with a buttoned cuff. (He also used the fabric for slightly boxy button-downs.) As for that delicate balance of dress-up/not totally dress-up,” he offered a black matching set made from a nylon-linen blend that featured just a whisper of tonal plaid. Another set—in Prince of Wales tropical wool—came with either pleated shorts or pants (sets were a big theme). T-shirts, meanwhile, were made from washed cotton that had been sun-dyed for a slightly bleached-out appearance, which was similarly applied to canvas work jackets with leather collars. The few patterns that were used—mariner stripes, oversized windowpane—had a hand-drawn look, lifted from Cy Twombly’s scribbled aesthetic.
Most of all, the collection felt smaller and more focused. “It’s a little bit tighter,” Hutson said of the collection. “We’re trying to get more selective.”