In the 12 years since Eckhaus Latta has been around, the cultish New York label has never lost its way. Mike Eckhaus and Zoe Latta have always held it down for their city, creating clothes both wearable and wild, biz-cas and party-ready. Consistency is key.
Oddly enough, though, Eckhaus Latta has also never really done a collaborative sneaker, until Spring/Summer 2024. Kinda.
The SS24 debuted Vans by Eckhaus Latta, which is to say Vans sneakers that Eckhaus Latta customized to suit the season's theme of textural interplay.
They're not really a collaboration — and likely won't see store shelves — but Eckhaus Latta's revamped Vans Slip-On shoes are a stab at something new.
Eckhaus Latta has previouisly partnered with UGG and Grenson for footwear collaborations, yes, but the label has never done a sneaker proper. This is Eckhaus Latta dipping a toe into the medium — hopefully, actual Eckhaus Latta Vans are on the horizon.
Anyways, the Vans are only a tiny piece of Eckhaus Latta's larger SS24 puzzle. The collection is rife with EL classics — boxy T-shirts, dresses, and jeans cut from unconventional fabrics — and really emphasizes textural interplay.
Though EL occasionally indulges in some primitive production, splattering jeans with paint or printing patterns on cotton jersey tees, it tapped into some cutting-edge tech for SS24, bringing in 3D-fit denim start-up Unspun to devise bespoke sleeves and jeans layered with raggedly raw hems.
The Eckhaus Latta collection delivered a boisterous contrast to the SS24 runway show's sober setting, the venerable Rockefeller Center.
The entire affair, really, felt like an experiment in juxtaposition: familiar clothes transformed by translucent or gilded facades; a typically formal setting undermined by rave-ready clothes.
Those sort of distinctions are at the heart of Eckhaus Latta itself. As gently provocative as it may have been, it was also par for EL's course.
