Shinpei Goto has spent the past season traveling.
After two seasons of triumphant performances on the Paris runways (thanks to the financial backing received from winning Tokyo’s 2024 Fashion Awards), this season the Masu designer took stock of all he had accomplished so far. Working closely with Yuma Kishi, an artist who sees AI as “a form of alien intelligence”, Goto took his work from 2018 to the present and put it into an AI program to create a kind of Masu mashup. Poured. The purpose was to better understand Masu’s identity and achieve a vision of sorts so that the designer could improve upon what had come before. “I updated things that I thought I could have done better,” the 32-year-old player said.
Let’s see what this actually means in practice. First up, a vampirish overcoat that served as the base item for MASU’s first runway show in 2021. After spending a lot of time wearing it, Goto realized that it was too heavy, and so this time made it from lighter wool. He also added his own buttons (something he didn’t have time for before). Most notable for Goto was the brand’s popular, peak-lapel tailored jacket – seen in the last look – in which she swapped out the silk lining for a more durable cupra. He spoke about this jacket as if it were an old acquaintance of his, with whom he had unfinished business: “A lot of people became aware of Massu through that jacket, and so I decided to encounter it again. Determined to.”
Other re-ups included popcorn tops – a Masu staple – which appeared in the form of bomber jackets with a Pegasus silhouette on the chest or cardigans with Breton stripes. Standouts included crushed velvet bombers, ivy-style argyle sweaters (also printed on denim with a faded argyle shade) and needle-punched flannel shirts and pleated skirts that recalled the opulence of Chanel tweed. The throwback to nostalgia comes in the form of the brand’s first collaboration with PUMA, yielding a set of matching sweatpants and zip-up jacket.
Aside from the objectively good product, Masu’s appeal lies in its characterization and storytelling. This season the brand’s name was presented in the likeness of NASA’s red ‘worm’ logo (which the agency used from 1975–1992), printed on tote bags and winged helmets, created by milliner Nozomi Kurokawa. – Another reference to an astronaut (or perhaps an angel) who came from afar traveling on his ship. Like broken geodes, the clanging of beaten helmets revealed the glittering gems within – Massu’s space prospector had clearly endured a difficult journey.
In some ways, Goto is years ahead of his menswear contemporaries, in that he is consistently able to combine a masculine confidence with a delicate sensibility that always feels the latest in both silhouette and texture. He titled the collection 20XX, simultaneously connecting it to the current century and moving it through time, as well as rebelling against the tradition that designers must select entirely new clothes every season. Standing in his showroom, Goto expressed it more poetically: “I think it’s important to cherish our world.”
