Up for sale here is a nice piece from Undercover’s fall-winter 2015 collection, “No (B)orders”. Undercover has released a number of musician-inspired collections. For this season, although not quite as obvious as some of their others, the main inspiration came from David Bowie. The timing was interesting, as I’m sure this was produced before Bowie died, but the release happened to follow pretty closely after his death.
As usual with Undercover’s music based collections, Bowie served as the sort of muse, where designer Jun Takahashi went through a number of his looks, but also very much filtered them through the Undercover aesthetic, making them a bit more punk in the process.
Influences aside, what you have here is a double breasted overcoat that has been nicely deconstructed. Seams are all open and raw, with fringes of fabric hanging throughout. The fraying is intentional with this kind of piece, and the fabric is reinforced to where it won’t fray too much, just enough to look pleasantly disheveled. Fabric is a 100% wool and fully lined in cupro. The fabric is a medium weight in my opinion, making this a good fall-spring jacket on its own, or layered for the winter months.
As always, Undercover add a number of details that only they’re capable of really. Most seams are raw (although reinforced), intended to fray with wear. This was one of the hallmarks of the season actually, as most of the outerwear had similar seams. Another seasonal hallmark is that many of the seams are also three dimensional. That is, they are finished sticking out (think of an inside-out t-shirt to get the idea), rather than more traditional flat seams. This is most apparent on the arms and the rear of the jacket, creating another nice contrast. Exterior pockets are lined in a cotton fleece, making for a soft, cozy feeling. Front also has a translucent pocket, accessible from the interior. It makes for a nice little pop, especially if you use it for tickets, cards or something like that. Like all Undercover, these coats were produced in very limited quantities and pretty much impossible to get outside of Japan. Retail was about $1,000 in Japan and considerably more abroad. This is definitely the cheapest you’ll find it around.
Size is labeled a 3 and fits like a somewhat slim medium. Fit is reasonably tailored and slim in the body. I measure the chest at 21” and length at 38”. Sleeves are raglan and hard to get exact, but I measure the shoulders at approx. 17”, and sleeves at approx. 24” from the shoulder. The coat comes in very lightly used, very good condition with no holes, tears or stains. Made in Japan.
Shipping from Japan to anywhere will be $36.