Cos is the same wherever you go: its style signature is a bold line, simple and minimal, full of brightness and light.
The Swedish high-street brand has gone from a semi-cult institution to a global phenomenon in the space of barely a decade, and all this is due to the customer: the Cos woman.
She prefers the simple things in life: good design and functionality, art and literature. The Cos woman probably owns more than her fair share of canvas tote bags. She almost definitely owns a pair of John Lennon specs (if her eyesight demands it, that is; she is not the kind of person to wear something she doesn’t need).
Twenty years ago, the physical representation of this kind of woman was inaccessible, requiring swathes of expensive Helmut Lang and Issey Miyake. No longer. Now this kind of chic look can be be freely bought on a high-street level.
At the brand’s autumn-winter press day, held in a small art gallery just off Oxford Street in London, Karin Gustafsson, the head of womenswear design, goes through the next season’s offerings.
“This is a very important colour,” she says, handling the sleeve of an autumnal brownish-red wool winter coat. “We have several pieces in this colour.”
The coat (in red ochre, as Cos calls the shade) is simple and single-breasted, and the neutral-to-warm tones should lift and enliven most skin colours. The material has a pleasing compact flatness to it that is finished with raw seams and edges. It requires close examination to be fully appreciated. The ease and the complication together: this is what the Cos woman likes.
The mindset
This marriage of style and substance is what Gustafsson had in mind when she first started to conceptualise the potential Cos customer when the brand first started selling in 2007.
“We didn’t have a particular woman in mind,” she says. “It’s really more about functionality, about the mindset.”
The mindset in this instance is a longing for simplicity, innovation, longer-lasting clothing and a close alignment with cultural cornerstones (for instance, Cos's biannual magazine is put together by the team behind Fantastic Man and the Gentlewoman).
Both the clothing and the outward focus of the brand is intelligent, cultured and modern. It is the antithesis of youth- oriented brands that focus on trends and brash design.
Likewise, it’s an antidote to slightly more fuddy-duddy classics such as twinsets and pearls.
The Swedish aesthetic
Cos is also an encapsulation of a national aesthetic. As stripes and trench coats make a Parisian chic, so too do directional shirting and acres of black complement Swedes. The Swedish style is very much in line with Gustafsson’s mindset.
This is an area of the high street that, somehow, had never really been explored in fashion before Cos. The brand exploded and it continues to do so. You can also find similar clothing at Acne, or younger Cos affiliates Weekday and Monki.
Instead of buying beauty or youth, as we did before, with Cos we are attempting to buy intelligence or cultural awareness. Aligning one thing (clothing) with another more established institution (art and creativity) is a tried-and-tested method for producing cool.
Or maybe it’s this: Cos clothing is easy. It’s comfortable: rarely tight, easy to walk in, amply pocketed. One can go to work and for drinks afterwards, or home to mind children. The size range expands beyond 14. It is a uniform to stand out in.
