SSON TOOK US TO AN INDOOR RETREAT FOR SS27

For SS27, SSON Studios brought us to an indoor retreat. Sand underfoot, deck chairs set out along the edges, white brick and exposed ductwork overhead, and a humidity rating that'll fuzz up your hair in an instant. We took our seat for the 15-minute presentation and started to sweat before anything had happened, which did more to establish the collection's climate than any soundtrack or press release could have... and it was worth the while.

Co-founder and Creative Director Yulia Kjellsson works only in circular design, rebuilding second-hand textile into new shapes, and the interest is entirely in what that constraint forces. A bag arrives with its hardware, lining and seams already decided; what someone else would do is either hide all of that or build with it. SSON always takes on the challenge to construct with it, which is why so many of the looks read twice, as the source object and as the garment at once.

Large accessories dotted the runway, along with a real plenitude of bags and looks made from them. One model wore a black-and-white polka-dot dress that shifted dot scale as it went: small spots across a ruffled bodice, large ones across a tiered bubble skirt, with a black-and-white organic print trailing at the hem. Another walked in a sand-coloured sleeveless shell with a white hem showing beneath it and a black skirt wrapped and folded asymmetrically at the front, worn with black flip-flops on a kitten heel and very dark sunglasses. Beach clothes for a beach that is not really there.

Kjellsson has been open about using twentieth-century travel advertising and resort culture to look at consumption during a climate crisis, so the heat in that room was part of the argument rather than an accident of the venue.

The Swedish fashion label was founded in Stockholm in 2024 and sets hard tailoring against softer draping, with streetwear running through both. Copenhagen gave it a One To Watch slot this season alongside Renè and Taus, and on a schedule where circularity gets talked about far more often than it gets constructed, this was a label doing the actual building in front of everyone.

Another perfect example of the brand's design process, its attention to detail and its confidence in making something unusually outstanding, shine.