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"Currently airing on&amp;nbsp;Meadham Kirchhoff\u2019s&amp;nbsp;website is a short film titled \u201CA Cautionary Tale,\u201D featuring the house\u2019s Spring/Summer 2013 womenswear collection. It\u2019s engrossing \u2014&amp;nbsp;emphasis on gross \u2014 a spectacular, orchestrated mess of baroque confectionery with gilded sugar flourishes and bowed garters and&amp;nbsp;go-lightly chiffon wisps that suggest, in a way, the consequence of certain ravenous pleasures from the night before. The collection reads like an even-more-unhinged Sofia Coppola-Marie Antoinette, replete with dying roses and girls stumbling about upholstered settees, coated in jewelry and feathery bits and bobs. Thus, the Meadham Kirchhoff formula herein congeals almost as a pseudo-pornographic equation for fashion die-hards. Functioning ostensibly as an NC-17 rated sartorial Disneyland, it\u2019s campy and sexy and ostentatious \u2014 but there\u2019s an intellect beneath the pomp, a sharp and modern wit that supersedes the two-dimensionality of the frivolous.&amp;nbsp;Officially founded in 2006 by&amp;nbsp;Edward Meadham&amp;nbsp;and&amp;nbsp;Benjamin Kirchhoff, the London-based label has slowly gained traction in both the public eye and in bottom-line sales \u2014 their wares are now sold worldwide, with lucrative retail deals from highbrow&amp;nbsp;Net-A-Porter&amp;nbsp;to trust-funded hipster haunt&amp;nbsp;Opening Ceremony. While they\u2019ve grown physically, their aesthetic DNA (it can only be described as a garnished, cartoon-vomit-hued double helix bonded by glitter and frills) has remained unbroken.&amp;nbsp;Take for example their first catwalk sponsorship for Fall/Winter 2010 in which crowns and veils, cut in swooping shear and trimmed in dust-ruffles (and bows \u2013 even back then Meadham and Kirchhoff were using them as decorative touches) highlighted the show. The iconoclasm proved marvelously insane, for it basically swung a wrecking ball through the proverbial boudoir and sent its revelers scurrying out into the daylight. The duo progressed to Spring/Summer 2012\u2019s lighter-hearted and much hyped heart-emoji/eyeball motifs, vaguely reminiscent of&amp;nbsp;Takashi Murakami\u2019s&amp;nbsp;ocular jellyfish bloodline, to Fall/Winter 2012\u2019s faux-fur monsters in fuchsia and ochre, to Spring/Summer 2013\u2019s garish and off-the-deep-end princesses. Starting to get the picture?Until six months ago, though, a spoke was missing from Meadham Kirchhoff\u2019s spinning rims \u2013 menswear. It\u2019s a little perplexing to consider, for while their designs are sexy at least in color and pin-up-ishness, they undercut gender associations \u2013 rendered, actually, sexless&amp;nbsp;in the carefully choreographed milieu and subsequent settling of the dust. Everything up until this point looked like something the glittering asexual rat-packs of Stoke Newington or Dalston would wear (and in fact, did).&amp;nbsp;Thus, assumedly thanks to the success and stability of their women\u2019s line, the duo decided to introduce a capsule&amp;nbsp;pour les hommes&amp;nbsp;at London\u2019s inaugural men\u2019s weekend (preceding Milan and Paris\u2019 respective men\u2019s fashion weeks) this past June. The static display garnered critical acclaim, if not a bit of an audience recoil; here was a mashed up, any-20-something\u2019s apartment, like some kind of&amp;nbsp;Dan Colen&amp;nbsp;and&amp;nbsp;Dash Snow&amp;nbsp;shredded-phonebook drug den laced with flowers and potpourri, empty pizza boxes, and Disney character bedsheets (literally \u2014&amp;nbsp;Jasmine&amp;nbsp;was on the linens). Moreover, the boys themselves were no less, or no more, fitting \u2014&amp;nbsp;they appeared in various states of undress, in boxer shorts, fluorescent high-tops, skullcaps, and gold ankle-bangles. One model even had Sharpie ink (everyone\u2019s favorite party prank instrument) blocked out across his forehead to form the word \u201CWALLFLOWER.\u201D Again, the interplay between the translucent and the bejeweled, between hard street and pop-religion, came across not as Male with a capital M, but something without assignation \u2014&amp;nbsp;the realization of a regular club kid Joe waking up in an incredible outfit from an incredible night, ready to relive it all again come sundown. Meadham and Kirchhoff do not simply design clothes \u2014 they design aspirational or fantastic dreams of entire lifestyles, all the more exacerbated by their hyperactivity.&amp;nbsp;So, can&amp;nbsp;the over-the-top last for Meadham Kirchhoff? Will they eventually tone down their output to fit a more public standard? Is \u201CA Cautionary Tale\u201D actually a subconscious recognition of the sparkling razor-blade upon which they dance and the formidable parapet of convention to which they regularly give the finger?It is this writer\u2019s opinion that we won\u2019t see Meadham Kirchhoff pumping the breaks anytime soon, for this house caters in near perfect symmetric harmony to both an increasingly educated fashion fan-base&amp;nbsp;and&amp;nbsp;the eye-candy starved digital generation. Fashion, and fashion consumption whether it be purchasing power or perusing LiveJournals, has moved well past the days of the big box brands \u2014 much to the credit of places like the aforementioned Opening Ceremony. There has been a push towards individuality and quality, or, at least, the quality of the&amp;nbsp;ideas&amp;nbsp;behind the manifests. Meadham Kirchhoff is among the current forerunners of this proverbial enlightenment, a gateway label showcasing that a brave new territory exists beyond the Pradas and the Proenzas of the world. Moreover, the Internet has helped tremendously with smaller or&amp;nbsp;outr\u00E9&amp;nbsp;brands attracting bigger numbers, what with its endless comment sections and G-chats and embeddings. But Meadham Kirchhoff is&amp;nbsp;by&amp;nbsp;nature&amp;nbsp;more pixel-friendly than most, and was therefore&amp;nbsp;always destined for the blog-o-sphere out of mere aesthetic principle alone, regardless of whether or not one likes fashion or design. People want pretty pictures, and MK delivers them \u2014&amp;nbsp;without micro-nicheing itself.&amp;nbsp;Labeling this brand \u201Cirreverent\u201D would be incorrect; they are not disrespecting the craft, they aren\u2019t cushioned by anything anarchic. Rather, Meadham Kirchhoff is celebratory at its core, milkshake-blending-in-an-apron-and-nothing-else all the guilty pleasures of modern living into unique ready-to-wear, good and worthy of its cult status. And what fun is any party without a bit of a warning label?&amp;nbsp;To see images from Meadham Kirchhoff\u2019s Spring/Summer 2013 sampling, click on the slideshow. &amp;nbsp;Meadham Kirchoff will show their second men\u2019s collection at London\u2019s upcoming Collections: Men weekend on January 7.&amp;nbsp;"^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
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