With his dedication to craftsmanship, his spare aesthetic and above all his eye for unapologetic sensuality, Ludovic de Saint Sernin is sparking a sexual revolution in menswear.
By JON ROTH
The way men dress is changing. It’s trickling down from runways and red carpets, and it’s bubbling up from a new generation of fashion-conscious men on the street. It’s not a question of streetwear-versus-tailoring, and it’s not the evolution of some new silhouette. It’s bigger than that.
For the first time in a long time, menswear is sexy. And not just sexy - sensual.
You see it in the sheer harem pants and off-the-shoulder tops at Saint Laurent, and in the reimagined Louis Vuitton harnesses. Suddenly, men are considering clothes that invite appraisal, that venerate the body, that provoke desire. At the vanguard of the movement is a relative upstart. His name is Ludovic de Saint Sernin, and he’s drawing the blueprint for a new age of sexiness.
In the three years since founding his eponymous label, Saint Sernin has earned his fandom by reintroducing a stripped-down sensuality that feeds the intellect of the fashion critics and the eros of his customers. His carefully crafted looks are not ostentatious, overdone, or try-hard. They spring to life only on the bodies of his muses, who show us that a tube top, for instance, on a broad-shouldered torso, somehow becomes something new and strange and appealing. In an era steeped in over-the-top maximalism, he reminds us that minimalism can be sexy, and sexy can be elegant - and that gender is really just a game we’ve all agreed to play.
Even today, it’s a gamble to stake your business on making men the objects of desire. To do it the way that Saint Sernin does - with clothes that are often soft, fragile and feminine - is riskier still. But it’s served him well so far. He’s already an ANDAM Award winner and an LVMH Prize finalist, and was recently inducted to Business of Fashion’s BoF 500. He’s collaborated with Swarovski and Sunspel, and his clothes have appeared on boundary-pushing artists like Casey Fischer and Solange Knowles. All those endorsements, plus his legions of fans of both genders, suggest Saint Sernin’s gamble is paying off.