Menswear: Move over Mr Macho

Over the past two years, fashion designed for men has quickly caught up in popularity and interest with women's fashion.

This year South African Menswear Week launched in Cape Town.

It included top stylist Chu Suwannapha's first menswear collection, which was shown to great acclaim.

Thula Sindi, a 10-year veteran of the fashion scene and leading designer of contemporary wear for women, revealed his new range of menswear last week at the Design Indaba in Cape Town.

The award-winning designer says moving into menswear was a natural progression. "I studied menswear. It was my original passion," says Sindi, who started his career at Vlisco creating men's and women's lines.

He says the collection was inspired by the way city people idealise rural life and vice versa. ''It's about combining those two cliches - rough leathers with delicate cottons - to create a look that's reminiscent of cowboy/milkmaid yet with a very strong, sophisticated city feel."

Sindi, who has always emphasised simplicity, has kept the collection confined to whites and browns.

"The word 'beauty' is not often used in menswear - which has been obsessed with three predominant themes: machismo, military and debonair, tropes that happen to not interest me at all," says Sindi.

• View the range at spree.co.za or thulasindi.com