“Improvised concepts” read text writ large across a sweeping cloak in Jun Takahashi’s Undercover collection. It was both right and wrong. The collection, Takahashi said, was about improvisation; but there wasn’t a concept. “The men’s is daily wear, rather than conceptual like the women,” he said, leafing through a tome published with Rizzoli that explores his extensive and acclaimed back-catalogue. “They’re clothes I want to wear.”

The improvisational part was due to the way in which Takahashi assembled the resembles, adding patches, text, and images to clothes drawn from utility and workwear, the biggest single influence across the entire spring 2017 menswear season. Takahashi’s take was typically twisted — the seemingly random slogans applied, he said, like music lyrics to animate the surfaces. Sometimes, there was a feel of punk to their nonsensical, near-situationist placement: the words “offence,” “stability,” and “attack” subtitled images of an owl, seagull, and raven respectively, printed onto Cub Scout–style badges and affixed to a shirt. There was no explanation as to why.

The strongest looks were the four openers—they captured some of the snarling, aggressive transgression that makes Takahashi’s womenswear shows such an experience. The swathed heads, billowing blankets, and bombers marked with odd symbolism had a potent, rebellious energy, echoing the dissident garb of any number of anarchist protestors peopling grainy news footage. They felt of our time. They were strangely at odds with the rest of the collection’s looks, though, which were proficient but familiar, sketching out the silhouettes of standard work gear. The details on those made them something else of course, better served by Takahashi’s showroom than any catwalk. And when the whole thing was pulled apart into separate pieces, you couldn’t distinguish between those radical protestors and the proletariat garb. Bar the fact they’re all clothes Takahashi—and other men—will want to wear.