Forget Florals. This Year, We're Wearing Fruit

certainty.) And as we sit here at the tail end of spring, one month away from the official start of summer, it comes as no shock to see flowers of all sorts in the current menswear collections. Men have gotten more and more comfortable wearing bright patterned shirts—and that's great. But another motif has also bloomed, something else entirely but still equally bright and vibrant. It is…fruit. That’s right: charming fruit prints—everything from from peaches to lemons to cherries and beyond—is having a bit of a moment.

Stüssy—the “Chanel of streetwear”, as Rachel Tashjian put it earlier this week—is here to loudly lead the way. The beloved brand just released its latest summer season, which included a peach-covered camp-collar shirt and matching shorts. (The set comes in two colors, too.) The New York label Awake NY offers a graphic tee emblazoned with a half-toned lychee and a v-neck sweater vest with an embroidered lemon as bright as the sun. Virgil Abloh's Off-White sells a scallop-edged sweater with funky lemons knitted into the front and sleeves. 

On a similar citrus trip, designer Teddy Santis has teased two juicy graphics, presumably from a forthcoming drop of Aimé Leon Dore’s spring-summer collection. And the French fashion label Jacquemus skews a bit sweeter by printing photorealistic cherries on a bowling shirt, a long-sleeve oxford, and a regular old cotton tee. You can truly have your pick from the menswear fruit bowl.

The fruit-as-a-graphic in men's clothes isn't wholly new: Tommy Bahama has been putting pineapples on dad-approved vacation shirts for decades. The considerably cooler Supreme has been throwing fruit on its clothes for years, even going as far as chucking a photo print of produce on a crispy white tee. (Timothée Chalamet is quite fond of a cherry-covered Supreme sweater from a 2014 collection.) 

But this moment feels a bit grander in scope, bigger than a couple one-off occurrences. To see the motif show up in collections from both an iconic streetwear brand and an upscale French label is just another signifier of how in sync the fashion spectrum's two sides really are. The real upside here is that you can now add a vibrant, mouth-puckering punch to your summertime fits without worry of catching a “Florals, for spring?” quip. Just go with some fruit instead.