In his latest chapter, Simon Porte Jacquemus has turned the soil of memory. Le Paysan – translated to: the peasant – is the designer's latest collection, and a homecoming of sorts.
With Provence in his lungs and the sun-soaked grit of rural France beneath his fingernails, Jacquemus is leaning into the quietude of the countryside. This is where the designer's young life began, by his adored mothers' side, and – if our first glimpses of this campaign are to be belived – where he longs to remain, at least in spirit.
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The designer posted a first look of the collection campaign on Instagram in a series of short vignettes. He calls it an homage: to family, to culture, to a life before fashion week calendars and monogrammed storefronts. You can feel the reverence. Linen dresses caught in truck doors, a child watching his mother apply rouge, de-podding beans for lunch. There’s nostalgia, yes, but not in a saccharine way. This is the past repurposed – honest and dignified, reimagined for the runway and the farm alike.
As with his sun-drenched films and windswept runways, Le Paysan reads like a diary entry. Personal, poetic, and profoundly French. He’s not just telling us where he’s going—he’s reminding us of where he began. And in doing so, he closes the loop.
It’s easy to forget, in fashion’s carousel of spectacle, that Jacquemus is a romantic. Not just of love, but of place. In Le Paysan, he’s not chasing aesthetic trends – he’s chasing a dream of permanence. A life where simplicity is power. Where the land gives back what you give to it. It’s utopic, maybe. But Simon has always designed like someone who believes in beauty’s possibility.
