Eli Russell Linnetz had just finished his fall collection for ERL and was scheduled to photograph it when, the day before the shoot, he received a call from his sister saying that he and his family needed to evacuate their home in Venice, California. The devastating fires that have dilapidated countless communities in Los Angeles had started a few days prior, and while Linnetz does not live nearby enough to be directly affected, there was an arsonist that set a fire ablaze in his neighborhood.
Linnetz said at a showroom appointment in Paris that, in line with his cinematic, narrative-driven style, this collection was initially going to portray a group of “Beverly Hills kids on a ski trip to Switzerland.” While this lookbook does feature some of that in the outerwear, backpacks, and utility nylon sets, most of this lineup breaks the ERL mold with pulled-back, monochrome styling, and a very ’90s-but-timeless American sportswear feel. This aesthetic shift is the result of that evacuation.
“We had just laid out the whole collection, but I couldn’t take everything,” said Linnetz at a showroom appointment in Paris. “That night I just grabbed the first things that came to mind to shoot,” he recalled, “it was a very strange way to edit the collection, but I ended up photographing only my favorite pieces, which I took as a reset.” ERL is turning five this year. Even if not entirely intentional at first, this was a timely tone shift.
“It’s a more mature approach,” Linnetz said of this collection. It has always been an ERL signature to embrace Americanisms and reimagine the unsung sartorial heroes of American casualwear. This has, at times, made the label come across more as an experiment on styling than a design proposition, but Linnetz’s eye here—less on narrative and more on the clothes themselves—allowed the nuances with which he designs to come into focus. “This, to me, is the modern American man,” he said. See the introduction of nylon tailoring cut slim but with ease, or a range of knitwear from the kind of classic, ineffably flattering but basic turtle neck a romcom heartthrob would wear in the ’90s to signature ERL chunky knitwear rendered in neutral tones.
“I’m finding beauty in really simple, straightforward things,” Linnetz said. Such as the perfect lived-in wash in jersey crewnecks and button down shirts, the kind you’d seek for hours at a vintage shop; and of a range of trousers, from crispy blue jeans to a fantastic wide-legged double pleat dress style. As it turns out, Linnetz can cut a great pant. “I want to create those things that you remember, but also don’t exactly exist,” he said. His clothes are familiar and reminiscent of a simpler, greater time, surely, but here he has nailed down how to make them special. “They don’t exist in these proportions and fabrications,” he clarified.
Linnetz said that most of ERL’s top clients happened to live in the Palisades. The designer has offered to replace their lost pieces. He is also currently housing friends whose belongings were victims to the fires. They’re now dressed exclusively in ERL, he said with a half smile. There are times in which fashion appears frivolous, others when it can feel essential for its ability to act as both a physical and emotional haven. Linnetz is currently on a tightrope in between both. It’s an experience that will likely mark how he operates the next five plus years of his business. Based on this collection, it will be for the better.
