A season of tactility, texture and touch – so runs the byline for the September 2024 Style Issue of Wallpaper*, our deep-dive into the A/W 2024 fashion collections. On the cover, seminal American model Kelly Mittendorf – who began her career over a decade ago when she booked a Prada campaign aged just 16 – appears in a shaggy shearling coat from McQueen, part of designer Seán McGirr’s debut collection as creative director of the British house.
Photographed by Nicole Maria Winkler and styled by Wallpaper* fashion and creative director Jason Hughes, it featured as part of a series of images exploring the texture-rich ensembles of the A/W 2024 womenswear collections, from glossy leather to enveloping shearling and faux fur. These are clothes that are as pleasurable to wear as they are to look at – a mood of sensory pleasure that runs through the season’s collections.
‘Tactile, reduced and raw’: the sensory pleasures of A/W 2024
‘The theme of the story was skin on skin,’ says Winkler. ‘We wanted to create something very tactile, reduced and raw with leathers and skin-like materials. I’ve been working around themes of materiality and the female body for a while, so this felt like a natural extension of some of my personal work.’
‘It was special to shoot the day before I turned 30,’ adds Mittendorf. ‘Turning 30 means I’ve officially spent more than half of my life on set, and it feels like a full circle moment to know who I am while working on a project that felt so sensual and present and collaborative. Twist my arm to hop on a plane to London and lounge about in luxurious clothes with wonderful people.’
Model: Kelly Mittendorf at Elite London. Casting: Ikki Casting at WSM. Set design: Kim Harding. Hair: Yumi Nakada-Dingle using Bumble and Bumble. Make-up: Sunao Takahashi from Saint Luke using Byredo. Manicure: Jessica Ciesco at Snow Creatives using Nailberry. Photography assistant: Tom Porter. Set design assistant: Lucy Ann Fraser. Fashion assistant: Lucy Proctor Production assistant: Ady Huq. Digi tech: Anna-Sophia John.
This article appears in the September 2024 issue of Wallpaper*, available in print on newsstands, on the Wallpaper* app on Apple iOS, and to subscribers of Apple News +. Subscribe to Wallpaper* today.