This season, Rentrayage examined fashion on a smaller scale. The brand’s flagship store is in Kent, Connecticut, and though it was not an explicit inspiration for the fall collection, designer Erin Beatty crafted a slimmer selection of upcycled garments meant for a direct-to-consumer countryside way of life rather than a gargantuan wholesale operation.
The designer just got back from a trip to India and Pakistan where she walked through her fabric sourcing and manufacturing facilities. “Pakistan essentially receives the world’s vintage,” Beatty said. There, she explained, the materials are hand-sorted. Some are sent to be made into rags for car washes, for example, and others are transformed back into the clothing that Rentrayage makes today. She asked herself: “How do I take these materials and make them into something that feels really relevant?”
Throughout the brand’s almost seven years, the focus has remained on upcycled Japanese suiting, embroidered textiles, and reimagined denim, which continues to be the foundation of every collection. A prime example of this was a barrel-leg style of jeans spliced together from two different vintage pairs. Many of the garments followed a similar Frankenstein-like formula, including an upcycled long sleeve made from vintage T-shirts and the top of an intarsia sweater that was joined with the bottom half of a crewneck.
Elsewhere, knit cardigans were made from recycled yarn sourced from Peru and striped button-up blouses featured floral embroidery from India. Also made in India was a series of quilted pieces that veered slightly more sculptural than the rest of falls’s relaxed but eclectic silhouettes. Regarding the likely response to the collection, Beatty said, “Luckily, people will have a strong point of view.”