In her most extensive collection to date, Robyn Lynch takes her crew of Irish lads on a wild winter holiday that is less about the slopes, and more about the après-ski amusements this AW22 season.
Get your goggles at the ready – Robyn is continuing to purify her brand’s identity while also amplifying its range. This collection is a logical progression from SS22, as it builds on Robyn’s collaboration with Columbia’s outdoor expertise by exploring novel design approaches while remaining true to the brand’s sustainable heritage. Robyn opted to shift her collaboration into the area of outerwear after designing an entire line out of Columbia’s deadstock items for her previous excursion.
Robyn Lynch, a Dublin-born menswear designer, started her eponymous label after graduating from the Menswear MA at the University of Westminster in June 2018. She previously studied Printed Textiles at Dublin’s National College of Art and Creative, combining recollections of her Irish heritage and culture with a youthful design approach that reforms classic menswear notions. Robyn has walked the runway twice with Fashion East before making her solo debut at London Fashion Week Men in January 2020. After collaborating with Rapha in 2020, this season represents the second chapter of the designer’s partnership with Columbia as part of the ‘Robyn Lynch backed by…’ series, in which the designer reconstructs deadstock clothes from specialised brands.
“Revisiting this project with Columbia has been an eye-opening experience. Getting to learn from industry leaders on technical fabrication development and science has been a highlight of this season, which has influenced the way I work with deadstock, but also my approach to design in general.”
The ten-piece collaboration project for this AW22 season demonstrates how to elevate the reworking process and maximise the sustainability potential of the current deadstock. “I’m becoming more precise with the upcycling process in understanding which aspects work and which don’t,” says Robyn.
The outerwear’s unique ‘OUTDRY’ technology in ecologically friendly fabrics serves as the foundation for the designer’s characteristic forms. Columbia’s folding raincoats, which Robyn turned into cropped puffers with scalloped ends on the sleeves, are a good illustration of this transformation. The usefulness of hi-tech fabrics is always acknowledged and embraced within the designs.
The use of innovative technical textiles, nylons created from ocean debris is juxtaposed with reflective thread and beaded embroidery, which bring a feeling of sensuality to classic male athletic standards. “The inspiration of being back on the catwalk made me think of introducing more intricate elements into the collection,” notes Robyn. The embroidery form, a sign of Irish pride, reflects her home country and generates semi-abstract patterns throughout the clothing.
When developing references for her silhouettes, Robyn, like usual, looks within her inner environment. The Lynch family wardrobe continues to be a source of inspiration, with numerous pieces being transformed from personal objects of emotional significance into modern showpieces. Four of her father’s Dublin football jerseys from the 1990s and 2000s were scanned and fed into an algorithm developed by Synflux, a Japanese speculative fashion studio. They warped the scans and converted them into trompe l’oeil intarsia knits made of cotton yarns using their revolutionary, digital-first design methodology.
Knitwear is recognised as the designer’s artistic forte throughout the collection. For the first time, she is expanding her method portfolio beyond the usage of merino wool. Textured bouclé and delicate cotton knits demonstrate the breadth of density and thickness of her shapes, while a classic merino wool sweater returns in a refined version of a piece from her graduate collection. Robyn’s passion for creating new and distinctive fabrications has influenced the way she develops her garments. The lab-dipped nylons, for example, are custom coloured into vivid Pantone hues before being cut into cargo trousers and tracksuit-style bottoms. Knitted balaclavas and fitted Columbia winter boots round out the collection’s unique monochromatic designs in seasonal Pantone colours of chartreuse, electric blue, brown, and grey, adding to the collection’s slope-ready vibrancy.
Photos by: Chris Yates/ Chris Yates Media