Every Rory William Docherty collection starts with a painting of his own creation. “For me it’s a lovely respite or a reset to step away from clothes and not think about fashion,” he said at a preview of his pre-fall outing. This time though, he broke with tradition, using existing artworks cut into silk strips and interwoven into a dress handmade in his native New Zealand. “The strips are actually cut in numbers that add up to 10: there’s one centimeter, two, three, and four centimeter and then when you add all of those together…”
Of course, you don’t need to know about this near-obsessive level of detail, or see the “hidden signals” to appreciate just what a considered designer Docherty is. Since launching in 2017—staging his second-ever runway show only last year—his rise has been purposeful and thoughtful, tenets underpinning everything he does. Take the new addition of paper page sleeves, layered rectilinear 2D shapes to form shoulders on signature cotton shirting and a stellar Japanese wool jacket in black with jutting geometry. These came from leafing through sketchbooks, an act of reflection that transmogrified elsewhere into elegant origami folds on dresses with peeling folds recalling the titans of 1980s Japanese fashion.
Anchoring his experimentation is tailoring, Docherty’s bedrock, emerging here in herringbone trousers and trench. He’s not afraid to tease an idea out over seasons and repeat styles like the painter shirt recut as a breezy cotton day dress and upcycled Levis, with inserts of cotton canvas, each numbered and signed. “If I’m going to put something out, it needs to withstand the test of time, and it’s certainly not trend driven,” he said. “I want to have pieces and collections that carry forward, as well as look back and reassure the customer.”
That’s an inviting proposition, reinforced by his gender-agnostic approach (he doesn’t use “genderless,” wanting the pieces instead to “speak to the individual regardless of age, gender, race”), and clever ideas like a hand-crushed silk tank and skirt that can be twisted tightly or loosely when washed to adjust fit for different bodies. His best comes, though, in combining this considered approach with a good dose of free-flowing creativity, the type that previously compelled him to add flourishes like sweeping fringes and patchwork shaggy shearlings. Citing late ’70s and early ’80s Yves Saint Laurent as a subliminal influence, those more statement pieces keep us interested in his quiet consideration. It’s a tradition he shouldn’t break with.
