Standing Ground’s SS25 Show Was a Textural, Sculptural Dream

Words Ella O Gorman

Rather like the Neolith­ic mono­liths that Michael Stewart’s Stand­ing Ground draws inspi­ra­tion from, his lat­est col­lec­tion was strong, sub­stan­tial and seem­ing­ly tran­scen­dent. Renowned for his exquis­ite and rig­or­ous crafts­man­ship, the Irish design­er had just become the inau­gur­al recip­i­ent of LVMH’s Savoir-Faire Prize, before stag­ing his debut SS25 stand­alone show in Lon­don last September. 

The most fer­vent of fash­ion­istas couldn’t help but gaze in awe at his lat­est offer­ing, which built on the brand’s increas­ing­ly dis­tinc­tive sculp­tur­al sil­hou­ettes informed by ancient archi­tec­ture and rur­al land­scapes. Whilst still mak­ing fre­quent use of the draped bias-cut jer­sey fab­ric that has become syn­ony­mous with the brand, Stew­art broad­ened his sar­to­r­i­al hori­zons by adding new tex­tiles to the mix such as vel­vet, leather and semi-sheer silk– all of which were metic­u­lous­ly cut, draped, and ruched. 

The show was off to a strik­ing start with a sump­tu­ous ebony vel­vet gown, draped expert­ly across the wearer’s tor­so. Iter­a­tions of sleeved jer­sey mini-dress­es fol­lowed, replete with coor­di­nat­ed jer­sey-encased microbeads cas­cad­ing down their skirts- imbu­ing the fab­ric with a fun, tex­tur­al flair. The intu­itive struc­tur­al sim­plic­i­ty of Stewart’s design phi­los­o­phy tri­umphed through gowns adorned with hoods and intri­cate rope detail­ing– which when manip­u­lat­ed around the mid­sec­tion of the gar­ment, evoked a spinal quality. 

In the cre­ation of these 22 stat­uesque gar­ments, the design­er drew from a colour scheme which mod­u­lat­ed from black to burnt orange, to bright spring­like hues of pink, red and blue. This col­lec­tion also marks the made-to-order brand’s first for­ay into work­ing with leather – exhibit­ing a long leather coat and a short­er padded jack­et with slight­ly pro­trud­ing shoul­ders. What left a last­ing impres­sion in this col­lec­tion was how each piece was craft­ed to com­pli­ment the form’s nuances and how these immac­u­late­ly ren­dered pro­por­tions achieved a sat­is­fy­ing equi­lib­ri­um between roman­ti­cism and lux­u­ry lib­er­at­ed from ostentatiousness. 

Ulti­mate­ly, Stand­ing Ground’s SS25 col­lec­tion accen­tu­ates the pow­er of a strong, pris­tine sil­hou­ette. Through embody­ing moder­ni­ty and clas­si­cism simul­ta­ne­ous­ly, the brand’s sen­su­al, stat­uesque gowns under­score the impor­tance of tech­ni­cal exper­tise as well as an appre­ci­a­tion for artistry. Like the pre­his­toric stand­ing stones that the brand is named after– Stewart’s design style is ground­ed in longevi­ty and resilience. His mea­sured, mas­ter­ful approach is admirable in a world where a sur­plus of whole­sale sup­ply has become all too fre­quent. This strength of vision, paired with his tech­ni­cal prowess, makes for a brand that deserves to endure.

Dis­cov­er more of Stand­ing ground on Insta­gram @standing_ground_ and on the Fash­ion East website.