In a profoundly messed up world where Dion Lee didn’t make it as a designer, he could have always tried his hand at modeling.
Lee’s best Blue Steel and one of his chiseled cheekbones are the focus of Paul Scala’s camera for the new issue Manuscript magazine. The high-contrast cover shows the designer retaining his majestic gaze while getting a face full of water, which picks up the glaring red background and kind of looks like blood. It’s rather intense, and would make a great poster for a Quentin Tarantino film about Lee’s figurative slaying of his sartorial competition.
The same left eye and fierce theme continue in an inside spread. In one image, Lee scowls at the camera while pushing the blade of a pair of scissors into one eyebrow, and in another wears a black turtleneck and a man-pout. The accompanying profile follows Lee’s exponential rise to the top of the game in Sydney and New York: He recently presented a second acclaimed collection at New York Fashion Week and finally opened his first standalone store, the industrial Site 01 in Sydney’s historic Strand Arcade.
Lee also touches upon his plans to introduce menswear to his existing repertoire. We’re feeling a men’s turtleneck revival.
