Joey Samson is all too Human

MANILA, Philippines -  Fresh from his success at Singapore Fashion Week, top designer Joey Samson launches his collection with Human.

Combining his menswear and sportif signatures with the brand’s laidback style code, Joey comes up with a collection that is at once street-ready and runway-worthy. What’s more, both guys and dolls can have fun while looking fashionable, as endorsers Luis Manzano and Isabelle Daza, prove.

For the boys, there are drop-crotch pants in stretch cotton, best paired with graphic, color-blocked polo shirts. But instead of the typical solid panels of color that have been exhausted, style-wise, this season, Joey has turned his knowing eye to a more jagged interpretation, for a more Keith Haring-like primitiveness. Contrast-collar pique shirts in pink and black also pick up on the idea of emboldened basics, as do the printed-on plaid that adds distinction to the sports jacket.

For the girls, color blocks are freshened up again, when set against black. So goes the tune of a blue-tangerine-purple-and-pink-banded bodice of a black-skirted dress. But again, in keeping with the theme of the ironic and the unexpected, it’s the masculine-inspired tailoring in black, white, and grayscale that makes a powerful statement.

There are high-waist boyfriend shorts, paired with a gray-bodice dress shirt, or a playsuit in cement, and the piece de resistance: an ingenious illusion-tuxedo sweatshirt dress. More boyish touches come in the form of the very trendy varsity jacket with shiny red sleeves, or the mesh-sleeve topper in black on black.

Joey has brought retail into inimitably fashionable territory — no small feat, in a commercially-inclined ballgame.

The Joey Samson collection is available at Human boutiques in leading malls nationwide.