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Carhartt WIP / Matthias Leidinger
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Long appropriated by the culture, Carhartt knows exactly where it sits. Forget the face of workwear, Carhartt is the king. Heck, it's also the queen. This is what workwear royalty looks like.

Carhartt won't say it out loud so look to its younger sibling, Carhartt WIP, for a distillation of the label's utility as something overtly stylish. Carhartt WIP's well-named Icons campaign is a digestible manifestation of this approach. 

Here, Carhartt WIP reclaims those same workwear styles long ago absorbed into greater fashion and repackages them with a newly stylish direction. 

Wearing utility pants and chore coats, for instance, models also sport diamante tiaras as if underscoring Carhartt’s status as workwear sovereign.

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Meanwhile exaggerated layering, like skirts over pants and hoodies over shirts, stretches these garments' original intent.

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And a shin-length denim skirt atop a pair of baggy blue jeans is a proportional contrast to the classic Carhartt hoodie worn above.

These are all Carhartt icons but not as you knew them. These tiered looks are knowing counterpoints to workwear standards, because the intent isn't functionality — it’s freedom of style. But, then again, Carhartt WIP isn’t just standard workwear.

These looks are quite literally mixing Carhartt icons into complete outfits representative of Carhartt’s current place in culture. That is to say, it’s everywhere: past, present, and future.

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