Jil Sander SS19: Soft Minimalism

The Jil Sander SS19 collection was compiled of timeless, minimal shapes but enlarged, oversized and crisp tailoring. To contrast this, Eugene Souleiman, ghd Fashion Week Ambassador, toned down the sharp lines in the clothing and concentrated on creating a look that was neither uptight nor stiff.

The only ‘sharp’ element is the parting of the hair. This works to draw out the lines in the designs without distracting from what are incredible outfits. - Eugene Souleiman

For Eugene Souleiman, nature was the inspiration, the look inspired by, “the strength of something minimal combined with the softness of nature, as if the hair is being tamed and nature is trying to fight it.” Eugene described the look as, “not hairdresser hair” due to the understated, almost messy texture, an effortless, “two day old” hairstyle that put the clothes front and centre.  

Get The Look

Each model in the collection was treated as an individual. As with the clothing, the hair needed to speak to the personality of the models.

1. For the ream of androgynous, school-boy styles, Eugene began by creating a blunt, sharp cut. This provided a baseline to introduce some texture into the hair. This ‘Etonian looking’ hair was then given an extra satin boost by running the ghd Platinum+ (£175) through the hair to create the soft bends and kinks as Eugene had envisioned. For those with longer locks, the hair was left in its natural state and only enhanced by twisting the hair and using the ghd Air hairdryer (£99) to add heat and seal the loose bends.
2. For the Afro-textured hair, Eugene wanted to achieve a slicked back, braided look. To do this, he began by blow-drying the hair with the ghd Air Hairdryer and smoothing the hair, ready for braiding with Wella Professionals’ EIMI Cocktail Me. This created a malleable material from the hair which allowed for sleek but fully textured braids to surround the crown of each of the models.

On his finished creation, Eugene said,

Ultimately - this was a look which contains no product at all, which is part of its magic. The tools and ingredients are an invisible force that is irreplaceable, but part of the role of the hairstylist is to make it look entirely natural.

We created styles with an ‘I woke up like this’ freshness, which when paired with these elegant clothes creates a real feel of audacious authenticity.