For a young brand Babatunde Oyeyemi’s Maxivive has covered quite some ground in the last year. Launching its diffusion line, MXVV in June and releasing three collections over the course of the year, Maxivive is quickly asserting itself as a serious menswear brand. At the Lagos Fashion and Design Week 2015, Maxivive showed a smorgasbord of clothes, mixing pieces from its fall/winter 2015 pieces with its Spring Summer 2016 collection, a decision that seemed ill-thought in practice.
On its own, each collection has its strengths but showing them as one unit created a disconnect that harmed the brand’s image. Hopefully in future seasons, Oyeyemi will favour cohesion (even if it means a smaller collection) over needless volume.
Oyeyemi’s preference for muted colours works for him and in this collection he introduces charcoal greys and navy blues to his roster of whites and blacks. The pieces from the 2015 Fall Winter collection were utilitarian with loose waist coats and jackets cinched at the waist with oversized detachable pockets. The new summer collection however shed bleakness for a carefree play on volume. This was evident in the jumpsuits shown, one a sleeveless full length one piece and the other, a capri-length pinafore. The hems of the trousers are tailored to resemble shirt cuffs, and the belt holes adorn the sides of shirts and work as detailing on pants. It’s a subtle commentary on the restrictiveness of mens fashion and the places it could go if buyers were more adventurous.
Layering is another theme in the new Maxivive collection, jackets, waist coats, kimonos are rife, thrown casually over the models, layered over silkprint shirts and wide sleeve tunics and other jackets. There is even a shirt worn as a skirt, a nod to the Rick Owens SS16 collection where models were worn as accessories.
Maxivive truly impresses with a slew of louche wear pieces. Returning to PVC which featured strongly in his first collection, Tunde pares down the PVC, creating pants and tunics with no embellishment or fuss save for black piping on the hems. These paired with unfussy striped tunics is the new incarnation of tribal, edgy without leaning too heavily on any culture. A stroke of genius in a collection where Oyeyemi is trying to find his voice.
