Glitter in the Karaoke Light

A few years before this collection, William Fan told an interviewer he wanted to create an entire world. You hear that from designers constantly and it almost never means anything. Fan—Chinese-German, based in Berlin—has been patient enough to actually try, and his Berlin Fashion Week presentation for the "It’s Your Time to Shine" collection was the clearest proof of that yet.

He showed it at Knutschfleck, a karaoke bar near Alexanderplatz, the TV Tower glowing through the windows while models walked through the room and across the bar counter. The choice of venue wasn’t a gimmick—it was the argument. The collection was about nightlife, about losing yourself in music, about the city after dark, and showing it in a bar where people actually do those things made more sense than a white gallery cube ever could. Fashion shows are usually aspirational in the most airless sense possible. This one felt aimed at an actual human being.

The clothes backed it up. The signature glitter coats remade in sequin fabric. A classic trench in tiger print. Lilac kitten-heel mules. Mohair cardigans, animal prints, cocktail dresses with real occasion built into them rather than just aspirational occasion. The feminine silhouette was pushed further than in previous seasons—a woman who gets dressed for herself, who wants to look sharp at midnight in a place with bad lighting and sticky floors.

Whether streetwear can also be chic is a question the fashion industry has been anxiously circling for a decade. Fan’s answer is essentially: the distinction was always fake. You make what you want with the materials you have, and if it’s good, it travels—from the street to the runway to the karaoke bar and back again.