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Erik Peterson Tom James Company Tampa Sarasota St Petersburg Lakeland: Menswear Designers Are in the Mood for Indigo
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The menswear world—is in the mood for the unique charms of indigo Repost off WSJ.com with select additions.
ONE YEAR AGO, Ariel and Shimon Ovadia, the twin brothers behind New York-based menswear label Ovadia & Sons, retailed an oxford shirt whose top half was pure white and whose bottom was tie-dyed with indigo. This prep-school surfer piece was a hit, and so the brothers revisited indigo in a bigger way in their latest spring collection.
The Ovadias are not alone. In the past few seasons, a number of fashion designers—and even some furniture designers—have caught indigo fever, using the dye to color everything from linen suits to sofas. Tommy Hilfiger, Michael Bastian and Christophe Lemaire all included indigo pieces in their recent collections. "It's kind of hitting all the right buttons," Mr. Bastian said. "Anything that feels like jeans, guys are already in love with."The trend is a revival of a technique that dates back millennia. Indigo is one of civilization's original clothing dyes. It first appeared when residents of India's Indus Valley discovered that the leaves of indigo plants turned dark blue when dried and, as fermented pulp, clung attractively to garments. The Japanese took indigo-dyeing to new heights between the 17th and 19th centuries. With the rise of denim in the late 19th century, indigo became a uniform of sorts for workers around the world. It was around this time that synthetic indigo, better suited to mass production, replaced the natural dye. With the exception of expensive niche brands like 45RPM, most denim companies use synthetic indigo.
Still, the comeback of raw (or unwashed) denim has prepared men to enjoy the gradual, idiosyncratic fade of the natural original. The Ovadia brothers tapped into this quality of the natural dye to achieve a variety of shades of blue—shown to polished effect in a head-to-toe indigo look from their Spring '14 fashion week presentation: peacoat, sweater, shirt and pants. "The color can be really rich and saturated for a polished look, or you can let it bleed away for more of a worn-in look," Ariel said.
The bleeding doesn't stop at the point of purchase. "How a garment fades and wears is a defining reason people get sentimental about their jeans," said Miles Johnson, design director of Levi's XX, which makes the brand's vintage-inspired Made & Crafted line. "Without realizing it, they fall in love."
Earlier this year, furniture designer Stephen Kenn teamed up with denim label Simon Miller on a natural-indigo collection that includes chairs and a sofa. They dye their fabrics in a design studio in Los Angeles. Most designers, however, seek theirs on every continent except North America. Japanese indigo has the most cachet, if only because hip local designers and the government there have preserved the once-glorious tradition as a point of national pride.
This was one motivation behind his natural-indigo leather blazer for spring, the designer Mihara Yasuhiro confirmed via email from Tokyo. Another, he added, was that "only with this technique can you have the vividness of a deep indigo blue."
Indigo's return is bound to have a widespread appeal. As Mr. Ovadia put it, "I don't think there's a guy on the planet that doesn't have something blue in his closet."
The Ovadias are not alone. In the past few seasons, a number of fashion designers—and even some furniture designers—have caught indigo fever, using the dye to color everything from linen suits to sofas. Tommy Hilfiger, Michael Bastian and Christophe Lemaire all included indigo pieces in their recent collections. "It's kind of hitting all the right buttons," Mr. Bastian said. "Anything that feels like jeans, guys are already in love with."The trend is a revival of a technique that dates back millennia. Indigo is one of civilization's original clothing dyes. It first appeared when residents of India's Indus Valley discovered that the leaves of indigo plants turned dark blue when dried and, as fermented pulp, clung attractively to garments. The Japanese took indigo-dyeing to new heights between the 17th and 19th centuries. With the rise of denim in the late 19th century, indigo became a uniform of sorts for workers around the world. It was around this time that synthetic indigo, better suited to mass production, replaced the natural dye. With the exception of expensive niche brands like 45RPM, most denim companies use synthetic indigo.