Subculture as a Language.
Pull&Bear have reunited with the British Fashion Council and its BFC NEWGEN programme, continuing as its principal partner with a new collection created alongside up-and-coming designer Oscar Ouyang.
Underlining the brand’s commitment to the new generation of designers, Pull&Bear’s latest outing with Oscar Ouyang and the BFC NEWGEN programme expands upon the Canvas for Creativity project, a platform historically driven by the British Fashion Council to aid emerging designers through financial support, mentorship and international visibility. Championing identity, expression, and creative exchange and meeting in the middle of Ouyang’s mind and Pull&Bear’s creative universe, the new collection transforms the energy, contradictions and rituals of youth into a timely transitional wardrobe, capturing those moments during your youth where ideas, energy, music, and your own creative expression feel at their most potent. Having moved from Beijing to London to study, Ouyang mixes East and Western influences in his work, using dressing as a form of social language that allows people to belong – or not – whilst communicating a distinct sense of identity.
The collection itself follows in the footsteps of Ouyang’s previous work whilst continuing to push his ideas further, with Pull&Bear providing a blank canvas in which to operate. The transitional wardrobe, which is made up of statement pieces and everyday essentials for both men and women, consists of outerwear, knitwear, denim, dresses, and logo-stamped basics, with accessories and footwear filling out the roster. Designed to transition between day and night, the familiar and the unexpected, the pieces utilise natural materials that are pulled, twisted, and reshaped so that classic silhouettes are redefined. Balancing design with personality, the range focuses on utility-inspired jackets, graphic knitwear, shirts, and a range of trousers coming in various shapes and drapes. Pushing and pulling on that tension between dressing up and down, the clothing traverses social plains with ease, boasting a colour palette that ranges from more serious shades of black, anthracite, navy blue and dark denim to day-time ready creams, camels and browns. The star of the show is Ouyang’s knitwear, a staple of his aforementioned work, with texture and craftsmanship being top of the agenda.
PHOTO CREDIT: Pull&Bear
Discussing his work, Oscar Ouyang had the following to share about his collaboration with Pull&Bear and the BFC NEWGEN programme:
“I felt it was an opportunity to communicate our visual language to a much broader audience while staying true to the identity of the brand. It was exciting to explore how our world could exist in a more accessible context. BFC NEWGEN is part of the history of London fashion. It is a programme that supported designers such as Alexander McQueen and Jonathan Anderson at decisive moments in their careers; being part of that legacy is an honour and also a responsibility.”
“Subculture is where young people collide: they exchange ideas, music, energy and ways of becoming who they are. The collection captures the broken-up thoughts, scattered notes and fleeting wonder of growing up, when everything feels new, urgent and slightly out of place.”
Pull&Bear’s collaborative collection with Oscar Ouyang is available to shop now via the Pull&Bear website.
Check out campaign and runway imagery below.
