Better Together. Martens’ primal punk swagger meets Owens’ post-apocalyptic glamour one last time as Dr. Martens x Rick Owens unveil their last collection. The first pair of Dr. Martens rolled off the production line in 1960, six decades later, the utilitarian boot has been adopted and subverted by Rick Owens. The Californian designer revamps the coveted ankle-height 1460s and calf-height 1918s with his signature lacing patterns and dark avant-garde aesthetics. The collection has the eight-eye and eighteen-eye boots at focus – stacked on a two-inch Quad Retro sole.
Crowned as fashion’s Lord of the Darkness, the Californian designer is known for his gender-neutral designs focused on the principles of deconstruction and sophistication – both boots have a distinctive oversized, heightened tongue, and are built using tumbled black Lunar leather: used to contrast the upright structure of the silhouettes. Long pearl laces are locked in place with dull silver hook trims and eyelets, furnished with heavy zips inside the ankles, black and pearl heel loops.
To understand the depths of the collaboration, Owens chose Ron Athey to spotlight the boots when shooting the above images adding that: “His work speaks to the eternal primitive in all of us and to our shared human experiences – fear, shame, sexuality, mortality and faith – in a timeless tradition of blood rituals, from the drama of human sacrifice on Mayan altars to a messiah on a cross to childbirth to a blood test to our current war… I asked Ron to represent this Dr. Martens collab as an example of how elegantly real transgression – and our individual searches for transcendence – can be.” And you'll be able to see that for yourself once the collection is available this Wednesday 2nd of December at Dr. Martens' flagship stores, select partners or online.
