The New N. Hoolywood Fall 2017 is Not What it Looks Like
Daisuke Obana takes his streetwear cred seriously, even going as far as casting his own models off the street days before his Fall 2017 show. Obana prefers the street casting method to take the focus off of the models and put it onto the clothing. When this happens, “it gets more special,” says a stylist friend of the designer. This season, Obana took to the streets once again, but this time, he went looking for inspiration in a cross country trip across America. “I was inspired by the ‘gutter punk’ subculture that I saw during my travels through America,” he said before his show.
Gutter punk is a whole genre with a unique style similar to punk, only more down and out—who often live on the streets. Obana was impressed by the cleverness of “street punks” and their ingenuity for improvising every day necessities from humble materials. Obana’s focus was not on achieving immaculate tailoring, which he has certainly done in previous collections. Instead everything from knits, denim, sweats and outerwear were all shown together, piled high in a crazy manner on each model. The controversial aesthetic resulted in the skillful layering of multiple jackets, puffers, and sweaters worn as scarves, along with enormous quilted blanket scarves. Obana collaborated with several brands for this collection including New Balance, Airwalk, Porter, and Avirex to produce outerwear like the glacier white shearling coat, which will be released as a limited edition.