Last season, Oscar Ouyang presented his debut show, Don’t Shoot The Messenger , during London Fashion Week, quickly establishing himself as one of the most exciting new names on the schedule. Having established a clear point of Ouyang’s work has often pulled together references from cinema, London’s underground scenes, and his own experience of growing up between cultures.

On Friday, Ouyang returned with Cygnet , his SS27 collection created in collaboration with Pull&Bear as part of the brand’s Canvas for Creativity project with BFC NEWGEN. The idea was to bring Ouyang’s world to a wider audience without losing what makes it his.

Throughout the show, it was not immediately obvious where Ouyang’s own collection ended and the Pull&Bear pieces began, with familiar garments reworked through detachable details, customisable hardware, hidden pockets and unexpected confetti touches. Festival boots were given a warm, worn suede finish, recalling the pairs you might have spotted in old Glastonbury street style photos.

“We worked with natural materials and familiar garments, softening, twisting and reimagining them, as if they were suspended between dressing to go out and surrendering to the moment. It’s chic with a little chaos: a burst of confetti just before the night comes to an end,” says Ouyang.

He was equally particular about what went into the collection. “I’m quite persistent.

I [said] we need to use everything that is a hundred per cent actual material.”

A lot of Cygnet comes from that idea of subculture as a language, and the way clothes become part of how people find and recognise each other. For Ouyang, that process starts long before the show itself.

“It’s like a long process. You have this collection for six months, and then it’s continuous dialogue about everything.

You go to gallery openings, you go to show openings, you go to all these kinds of music events, gigs and then you have a drink and then you talk shit together.” His friends are part of that conversation too, whether they’re sitting around listening to music, watching videos or collaborating on creative projects together. When it comes to putting the collection together, he says, “That’s the moment you pull your friends in to be like, ‘I love your taste on that, I love your taste on this’.”

Below, Oscar Ouyang walks us through his SS27 show in five references, from The Virgin Suicides to back-to-school season.

“The title is Cygnet . It's not a transformation, but it's somewhere that's in between. I find the word cygnet quite interesting because you have the ugly duckling, you have the swan, and you have the cygnet, which makes it a bit hard to define what kind of stage you are at. It's like coming of age.”

“Sofia’s visual references keep on getting referenced in fashion, but when it’s a classic, it's something we should just keep reinterpreting, especially when it’s the brighter side of a classic. It’s that kind of energy that I like to bring to the show. [It’s a] film that poses so many questions, and I think sometimes [they are] questions that do not have answers; that’s why people are so obsessed with it.”

“The reason we’re doing it at Rochelle is because it used to be a school for boys and girls, which is a continuation of the story from last season. Last season was this chic afters at this maison with young people throwing their last party at their parents’. This season is bringing them back to school. It’s like a prom or homecoming.

“[The collection has] a lot of satin and a lot of silver embellishments, which are inspired by antique silverware that we collect along the way. It’s kind of like when you go to homecoming, or you go to prom, and you’re wearing some pieces that you borrowed from your grandparents or your mom.

And then you throw on your best fit. I’m quite into the idea because that’s literally what we do every day.

You’re dressing yourself to make this statement, because it’s a social language.”

“Subculture just equals being niche, and that's why it’s called subculture rather than pop or mainstream culture. I think people misunderstand it as being like a subculture needs to be this kind of certain way. Whereas, in my understanding or my personal approach to it, subculture just means maybe a more niche group of friends, their own interpretation of culture and doing something that’s culturally related.”

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The London-based designer breaks down five of the references from his latest show, made with Pull&Bear and BFC NEWGEN’s Canvas for Creativity project