Matty Bovan’s A/W 17 show, the second of the Central Saint Martins grad’s collection to show during London Fashion Week’s Fashion East, showed us again the fun side of the business. No it wasn’t riddled with political footnotes or a pastiche of fashion’s current goings-ons; it was something altogether difficult to conceptualize: exciting. Not to mention the 26 year old’s show was again championed by Katie Grand, bringing along plenty of veteran élan to throw into the madcap mix that was pure Matty. His newest, knit-focused endeavor was at heart a tale of two cities, the designer noting medieval history (he grew up in the ancient city of York) and science-fiction films like Blade Runner and Dune as influences he drew from this time around. Many of the pieces were made with wool and textiles that were knitted or crotched by hand or motifs created on an Eighties knitting machine and then torn, punctured and boil-washed to create textures. Purposefully motley shapes were built from rectangular selections of fabric, skrim skirts, mountaineering cord and industrial buckles, adding on top accessories like driftwood, diamanté and chandelier jewelry. There were also tongue-in-cheek BOVAN CORPORATION patches that were a nod to those aforementioned films and pass at mass-produced corporate fashion–each piece designed by Matty this season is a one-off. The casting, which was done by Anita Bitton, featured loads of in-demand faces. A diverse group of girls like Adwoa Aboah, Dilone, Lili Sumner, Winnie Harlow, Sora Choi, Teddy Quinlivan and newcomer Aleece Wilson took to Matty’s runway complete with metallic face paint done by Miranda Joyce. Together they were part of the realization of preindustrial and post-industrial dystopias inventively meeting in the middle.