© Michael Tyrone Delaney / Highsnobiety

Ian Shelton doesn’t lie. Whether in lyrics, in interviews, or on-stage between songs, the words that come out of his mouth, he insists to writer Will Schube, are true. Perhaps he’s motivated by an adherence to old punk ideals. Or maybe he sees no point in making anything up because his childhood was so isolating and traumatic that it scans like an A24 flick. Whatever the reason, on God Save The Gun, the third album from Shelton’s punk-leaning rock group Militarie Gun, he sets out to prove that he’s the most honest dude in showbusiness.

Militarie Gun is probably one of the biggest hardcore-adjacent groups we’ve got. Post Malone is a fan, and Modest Mouse’s Isaac Brock makes a cameo on God Save The Gun, out next week. Their fanbase is bigger than ever, too. Which might be because there’s something refreshing about Militarie Gun — a band that, in the age of multihyphenates and brand deals and bigger-picture hustling, is purely aimed at writing songs and performing them. There’s no greater scheme, no angle. Just a bunch of guys in zip-up hoodies bopping around in a set piece garage. “It was really gross to me when the Turnstile moment was happening and people asked us, ‘How big do you want to be?’” Shelton says. “The only thing we care about is how we write a better record.” Read more.

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Sophie Kemp’s early 20s “felt like playing MASH,” she writes. “Kids: zero. Car: a 2010 Specialized Vita bike. Job: magazine assistant. Salary: $27,000.” At the time, she was working under Sally Singer at Vogue, showing up in sheer Victorian jackets, garbage-sourced trousers, and stacked skirts. “I wasn’t dressing to be sexy,” she says. “I was dressing to be a freak.”

Kemp’s outfits were a kind of armor, part defiance, part self-portrait. But therapy, heartbreak, and the quiet dissolution of her early ambitions reshaped her relationship with both fashion and identity. “I no longer felt an impulse to dress in a way that pissed people off because I was no longer so pissed off,” she reflects.

Now 29, Kemp’s approach to style is quieter but no less intentional. She still wears the same sheer Victorian pieces out of joy, not rebellion. Her evolution mirrors a broader truth about growing up: that irony fades, and authenticity takes its place. “Good style isn’t about trying anymore,” she writes. “It’s about feeling right.” Read more. 

© Kvadrat

When Raf Simons sat down with Highsnobiety style editor Tom Barker, he was ready to talk. Specifically, he was ready to talk about how horrifically boring he finds modern design to be. “If you think back in time, like to the 20th century or to early modernism — so many beautiful colors. In the ‘50s, you would go in the street and you would see only incredibly beautifully colored cars,” he says. “Today, all the cars in the street are kind of greyish. The phones, computers, everything is… greyish.”

In his new homeware collection with Danish textile innovators Kvadrat, Simons sought to singlehandedly counteract the greyish onslaught. In some cases, it took months and years to develop the fabrics and shades he eventually landed on. Lucky for him, this is exactly where he wants to be. “This is very different from fashion. I almost cannot say how much I like this pace,” he says. “Fashion is another animal these days. It's always against the block, nonstop.” Read more.

© Lyvans Boolaky / Getty Images

Speaking of the churn, something like one bajillion designers showed in Paris this year. And while some collections were quite good — including Matthieu Blazy’s Chanel, photographed exclusively for Highsnobiety by Karl Hab — what caught news director Jake Silbert’s eye was the clothing on the designers themselves. Much ink has been spilled about final-bow fits, but in this case, several makers stuck to the “good clothes” theory of things in a way that’s both remarkable and replicable. Read more.

© Karl Hab / Highsnobiety