Bazzar India 1

Within the first year of

his brand’s launch in 2015, the

collection Matthew Adams Dolan

presented for his MFA graduation show

at Parsons was stocked at Opening Ceremony

NYC. In its second year, Rihanna pre-ordered his

Spring 2016 line, almost in its entirety, sporting it in

her first Fenty beauty campaign and the music video

for Wild Thoughts (2017). Now in his third year, the

designer has been announced as a finalist for the

prestigious LVMH Prize after a successful second outing at

New York Fashion Week.

At the presentation for his Fall/Winter 2018 collection,

18-year-old Mumbai-born model Naomi Janumala opened the

show. “When it comes to casting, I have always thought it to be

very important to be representative of diversity. As an American

brand, based in New York, you need to be indicative of what the

country really looks like,” says Dolan about making this choice.

Something of a multicultural mix himself, Dolan was born in

Boston and raised in Sydney, Japan, and Switzerland, before moving

to settle in the Big Apple. (His atelier is in South Seaport in New

York.) “We wanted the first look to be a strong statement of

something that felt very simple and effortless, that is what the

essence of American fashion comes down to. Naomi perfectly

embodies the confident spirit of the youth.”

It’s true that there is an inherent coolness sewn into Dolan’s

pieces. Proportion play has become something of a signature

for the designer, evidenced by his Spring 2018 line. As is so often his

starting point, Dolan took American workwear classics and experimented

on them with varying degrees of volume, resulting in blown-out

button-up shirting, generous cable-knit cardigans, trucker jackets cut

with swing backs, and blazers with linebacker shoulders.

Over the next few months, Dolan will be working on his next

collection to be presented in September in New York. He also

plans on expanding the business and his team—at the moment

he is the only one working on the creative aspects—and he

hopes to take a trip to India. “I have always been obsessed

with Wes Anderson’s The Darjeeling Limited (2007) and

that really made me want to visit. And the food, of

course. My dad taught himself to cook so many

Indian dishes. He would spend the whole

day in the kitchen cooking curries for

us,” says Dolan. ■

By Divya Bala

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Bazaar
STYLE

Runway looks from Matthew Adams Dolan’s Spring 2018 and Fall 2018 showsIMAGES COURTESY MATTHEW ADAMS DOLAN