Winning an award from the Ecco Domani Fashion Foundation means more than a financial windfall, it is a mark of prestige allowing the winner to claim membership in an elite group comprised of designers like Zac Posen, Proenza Schouler, and Alexander Wang. However, for Korean designer Siki Im, winner of the most recent menswear award, Fall 2010 has little to do with the luxury associated with fine Italian winemakers, at least not directly. Last season Im showed an almost tribal collection, inspired by the dystopian novel Lord of the Flies. This season he revisits those same savages—after they have grown up to become failed Wall Street tycoons. Siki Im’s show took place in an abandoned Bowery warehouse, amongst ransacked cubicles, and shoddy fluorescent lighting, the pulsing sounds of a heavy metal band in the background. The clothes were at once tailored and architectural, with a roguish androgynous streak: the iconic suit of the finance industry reimagined as a base for chunky knit tops, man-skirts, and leather bondage straps.

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Photography Isabel Asha Penzlien

KEYWORDS: fashion, mens fashion