Fashion

Opening Ceremony X Mickey Mouse is Totally Hipster

by Tori Telfer

Pop culture collaborations have been all over the fashion world this year, from Maleficent x Hot Topic to the Simpsons x Joyrich. And they can go very, very wrong; after all, wearing a symbol of your childhood printed on your adult clothes can seem like you're trying too hard to be ironic — or that you're still mourning your lost youth. But somehow, Opening Ceremony's latest capsule collection — a collaboration with Disney and Vans — manages to side-step all that cloying pop culture irony, and ends up being what every pop culture collaboration should be: totally cool.

The collection was inspired by and uses the art from Steamboat Willie, the 1928 film widely considered to be the debut of both Mickey and Minnie Mouse, and which is celebrating its 85th birthday this year. You won't find red shorts and yellow shoes on this Mickey: Opening Ceremony drew inspiration from the black-and-white vintage filmstrip prints of Steamboat Willie, plastering them over everything from hoodies to button-downs to one particularly cool t-shirt.

There are a few odd moments — like a Mickey Mouse-emblazoned bucket hat, which just doesn't need to exist — but in general, the collection works because of its cool, insistent simplicity. The clothes stay strictly within a gray, red, white, or blue palette, and the only print is Mickey himself, in black and white, over and over.

And I'd be remiss not to mention the amazing promo video, which uses that "rubber hose-style of animation" so recognizable from the early Mickey shorts (you know, the go-to joke of the '20s and '30s, where someone's arm stretches on for miles).

Check out some of the coolest looks from Opening Ceremony x Mickey Mouse below:

Images: Opening Ceremony