Aries & PUMA's Techy Collection Is Gloriously Nostalgia-Inducing (EXCLUSIVE)
Sofia Prantera has been in fashion long enough to see the trend cycle in full effect. The founder of UK-based luxury streetwear label Aries was in the industry when some of fashion’s current trends were cool — the first time around. Now, together with PUMA, she’s revisiting them.
In the early naughts, Prantera watched streetwear’s early years develop while working at the influential London store Slam City Skates and headed up cult-favorite skate imprints such as Silas and Holmes. However, that isn’t the early naughts fashion history she has explored with Aries’ first PUMA collaboration; instead, Pantera’s dug through the archives of things she wasn’t the biggest fan of.
“There was a real division between skateboarding and snowboarding at that time [in the 2000s]. I was more into skateboarding. Snowboarding felt very mainstream at that point so I looked at it less,” Prantera tells me through a video call from her London studio. “Looking back, I see it in a different light.”
Though largely forgotten today, early-00s snowboard brands such as Burton Analog and Morrow Snowboards were pushing the boundaries of technical fashion. Ultra-functional clothing with more pockets than anyone could need, the type of gear gorp-core obsessives gawp over today, was made by these brands over two decades ago.
“It was an interesting era to look at from a design point of view because they were experimenting with technology in their clothes but it was almost like a fore-technology,” says Prantera.
The inventive nature of this era of snowboarding shines through in PUMA and Aries’ footwear: the PUMA Suede, an archive basketball shoe turned classic sneaker, and the PUMA Mostro, a spiky-soled Y2K favorite, are upgraded with functional features such as toggle laces, a rubberized mudguard, and lightweight fabrics. The result is a modern homage to the boundary-pushing technology of that era.
This type of retro-futurism extends into clothing with sporty mesh tops, water-repellant tracksuits, and experimental knitwear decorated through graphics exuding a ‘00s-era kitschiness. Prantera went through another journey of rediscovery while creating these pieces, unearthing old issues of Ray Gun, an experimental music magazine by David Carson that’s since achieved cult status.
“At the time, I didn't appreciate Ray Gun as much but there were a lot of amazing bands in there and the graphics were really random,” says Prantera. “Carson created this very post-punk style, the typefaces would be photocopied and skewed. He was very analog and I really wanted to recapture that, both in the graphics and the creative [campaign] we made.”
A year and a half in the making, a lot of research and development went into this collection (it will finally be released on September 5 via Aries and select retailers). It was a long-winded process of refinement but that didn’t phase Prantera: “I love to collaborate. I find it interesting getting into another brand's mind,” says the designer. “With PUMA, there were a lot of chances to really develop products. It was very much a design-led collaboration and it's not always like that.”
Aries, like most streetwear labels worth their salt, has always had a collaborative streak. It’s a brand that releases a lot of co-branded collections but also one that manages to embed a strong element of storytelling in each one. The extent of the research that goes into an Aries collaboration is on full display with this PUMA release.
