442: PMW Days 1 + 2 / Patent shoe patient zero
Plus the "New York hot guy" scent.
Welcome to Magasin’s pop-up Fashion Week newsletter-within-a-newsletter, where we go on the ground to suss out hot shopping gossip from scenes of interest: Paris Men’s Week, Days 1+2.
Weather report
56ºF / 13º C — I saw picnics on the Place des Vosges.
Itinerary
Tuesday, January 20th
9a Coffee with Michael Fong, Lost & Found Buying Director
11a Store scouts — Mes Chaussettes Rouges (which only sells socks and Pasotti umbrellas) and Charvet
1p Gajiroc showroom
3p Satisfy showroom
4p Levi’s showroom
6p Auralee show — Ryota Iwai again wearing the Cartier we spotted in summer
8p Dinner with Thistles team and Horace Page — Thistle himself in a vintage Chevignon flight jacket Miu Miu has used as a reference
10p Drinks with Carter Young Altman
Wednesday, January 21st
11a Store scouts — Beige Habilleur (for Fanni Lemmermayer and Heinrich Dinkelacker, brands I’d love even if they didn’t have those names) and Husbands
12.30 Lemaire show
1p A.Presse showroom — women’s will be launching this time next year, and the company is currently setting up an Italian office to focus on leather goods and accessories
2.30p Conkers showroom
4p Merrell showroom
6p Another Aspect and Aarticles drinks — happy to discover Christian + Jade’s wares
6.30p Walk with Kennedy magazine’s Chris Kontos, sporting crepe-soled cordovan Aldens
7p Niceness drinks
8.30p Dinner at Au Passage with Mfpen’s Sigurd Bank and Hugo Edwards, joined by Jake Woolf and Lawrence Schlossman
Outfit rundown
Lady White Co. Dri-Lite T-Shirt, Grindle, $70 / second-hand cashmere sweater, label says ‘House of Cashmere’ (going on a decade of wear!) / Levi’s 568, $110 / Le Majordome shoes, $620 / Mazarin Socks, $28 / vintage Henri Cuir leather bag / All Blues S bracelet, $570
Shopping gossip




According to Sensoria’s Paulena Lynch, “every hot New York guy” wears this exact Santa Maria Novella fragrance.
There’s some buzz about Toteme, which is here to launch the brand’s first men’s line this week. Significant stores have made appointments; I’ll be taking a look in a couple days.
The capital-F fashion kids are wearing patent leather dress shoes with their jeans. When I’ve tried to figure out where this most recent wave began, at least among the partakers I know, roads have led back to Crosscurrent editor Clarke Rudick, who told me at the Lemaire show that his are made by Loake. (He was also wearing a close-fitting, tailored Helmut Lang coat, one of many signs I’m already seeing that it will soon be a bad day to be a boxy fit.)
Speaking of dress shoes, Gajiroc’s Gi-Tae Hong was in a beautiful pair of J.M. Weston Derby Golf shoes, and I’m almost certain I clocked Kaptain Sunshine’s founder wearing the same pair (Will find out). Also seeing a fair few John Lobb Lopez loafers clipping by me.
And speaking of loafers, at Mes Chaussettes Rouges—a store devoted to socks, with shelves for every shoe size—I learned that loafers create holes in socks faster than any other shoe, because your heel rubs more when your foot isn’t laced into place. More about that store: I took a half hour train to get there on a gut feeling, and was amply rewarded—took home two Mazarin pairs, a wool and a cotton, and some sparkly Brescianis. I also got to be in the same room as a pair of Gammarelli baby socks (the Pope’s supplier) and a pair worn by Napoleon I (An auction bid win which, the owner joked, the business is still recovering from).




Conkers is burrowing even deeper into its yearning for a lost, slower British life. This collection’s scarves feature buttons that have been unearthed from sediment at the bottom of London’s River Thames—some of which, he’s been told, could date back as far as the time of the Roman Empire.
At A.Presse, an employee was unexpectedly wearing these UGGs in black, even though the brand flew out and laid its own signature plush green carpet—the same one you’d walk on at the Japan flagships—down on the floors of its stately new Place des Vosges showroom. Incidentally, UGG has flown a number of big menswear names from New York to Paris this week to consult. Cozy things coming?
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This is so excellent! As a lifelong loafer fan.. FASCINATING observation about the 🧦 heel holes. Really enjoyable writing, Louis
Hell yeah, always look forward to this