HUGO kicks off Berlin Fashion Week!

This being Berlin, it was held in a semi-derelict indus­tri­al estate. A for­mer paper fac­to­ry in Berlin’s Wriezen­er Kar­ree neigh­bour­hood, to be precise, with a min­i­mal­is­tic struc­ture, mam­moth ceil­ings, and enough wiggle room to host the 1000 guests in attendance.

Actual Proper Popstar Liam Payne per­formed a 3‑song set to a gaggle of ador­ing fans lin­ing the square-shaped stage. It was pop per­fec­tion. Fol­low­ing this, DJs object blue and Sebo K played high energy techno and the Berlinites showed us ever-awkward Brits how dancing is done – until we got a few bevs down us.

Of note:

A fan was spotted crying during his performance of Strip That Down.

Mod­els and friends of the brand Win­nie Har­low and Stel­la Maxwell came out in sup­port, as did the majority of Berlin’s club kids, who stayed until the 5am fin­ish and then probably went to some ​“day rave” somewhere (what are they like).

The par­ty was to cel­e­brate HUGO’s 10-piece col­lab­o­ra­tion with the brand’s rather fancily named glob­al ambas­sador Liam Payne, which is hit­ting the site and stores today. The col­lec­tion revolves around the for­mer One Direc­tion member’s per­son­al style, with min­i­mal­ism at its cen­tre, blur­ring the lines between for­mal­wear and ath­leisure in the process (formleisure?). Detail­ing has been metic­u­lous­ly thought out – you can see bits of Payne, for example, in the trib­al-style arrow etched onto the zip­pers, as well as on the sides of the trousers (a reference to his heavily-inked – and nicely toned – arms).​“He’s 25 so he has a very nat­ur­al intu­ition, but also he’s very nat­ur­al in his requests of how he likes to have things done,” says Bart de Backer, Senior Head of Design at HUGO BOSS.​“[The collection’s] not about a cer­tain age, it’s more about a type of lifestyle and an atti­tude. When I think about a per­son wear­ing HUGO, it’s not the per­son that search­es for the estab­lished; it’s the per­son that tries some­thing new, who is into fash­ion but isn’t shout­ing it out loud.”

The full cap­sule col­lec­tion is avail­able to buy from today on the HUGO web­site and in select­ed stores around the world. It’s almost like we timed the article.

Rough.