I love to see a designer stretch, try something new. Dries Van Noten has become a master at ethnic references, and colorful cultural mixes in his collections. This season he showed a very subdued and tonal collection but with the same brilliant results. I know this seems contradictory from my usual call for menswear designers to be more daring with color, print and pattern but since Dries Van Noten has done just about everything possible in those areas somber was one of the only directions left to go. The shoes are great, the band collar shirt seems new when mixed with the tiny suit, the outerwear is particularly strong, I think this is the first time I've seen denim on his runway, and again more great double-breasted suits.