JULIEN DAVID AUTUMN/WINTER 2015-16 READY-TO-WEAR PARIS FASHION WEEK

Laid out, the base ingredients of this collection—camouflage, masculinity, equestrian and military garb—seemed unpromising in their staple-ness. Yet this outing proved a slight delight. Julien David’s chief motif was inverted camouflage, rendered in tape or print or intarsia (or tape on print) and fashioned with the intention of being visible. Hardly a new idea, true. Along with a secondary decoration—a slightly stretched line-drawing print of parading soldiers—his camo’s patterns played on silk jumpsuits, wide pants whose marching orders ended just north of thick-soled high-tops, piped riding jackets and double-face cotton, and liberally vented greatcoats. Sometimes, underneath those greatcoats (which had contra-colored lapels that emitted a faint aura of a Jermyn Street dressing gown), he slipped in a high-cut nylon parka.

The impact came via David’s marshaling of his clothes. He has a facility for mining unexpected yet harmonious interactions that can be tedious to describe in overlong detail, but are a pleasure to have the eye conquered by—e.g., the just-so flash of drawstring fishtail finning out from underneath the base of a piped hunting hem, or the interaction of wide cuff with puckered seam on his pants. There was also the pleasing harmony of a navy nylon technical shirt beneath a burgundy taped camo jerkin. The parts were fine, and the sum of them more so.