Perhaps the biggest obstacle facing menswear designers is menswear's lack of malleability. Female clothes seem infinitely adaptable, but the staples of the male wardrobe – jeans, shirts and, especially, lounge suits – can really bear only minor adjustments. Stray too far from the blueprint and the wearer goes the way of the plank.
Still, they keep trying. They're imaginative people who find their imaginations restricted by in-built confines: Heston Blumenthal forced to do the Earlybird Menu at a Harvester year after year. Who can blame them for occasionally trying to nitro-poach the Cajun chicken burger?
Well, perhaps the people who are forced to eat it, which brings us to the print suit, which is big on the catwalks this season. Has anybody ever looked good in a print suit? Not Graham Norton, perhaps the most high-profile print-suit sporter. Not the poor soul on the Comme des Garçons catwalk in a monochrome skull pattern suit, the trousers of which finished just below the knees, around the same area the crotch hung down to; nor his chum, in a Givenchy leopard-print suit, shirt and shoes. And not me, wearing a psychedelic Paul Smith creation covered in astrological symbols. It looks like something a minor 60s icon who overdid the mind-expansion might wear for a comeback gig at Northampton Roadmenders. Come on, Heston, put the dry ice down: crackerjack king prawns and a mixed grill for table six.
• Alexis wears jacket £405, and trousers £225, both by Paul Smith.
Shirt £45, by Shore Leave, from urbanoutfitters.co.uk.
Shoes £125, by Russell & Bromley.
Photograph: David Newby for the Guardian. Styling: Aradia Crockett. Grooming: Lisa Stokes.
