It’s getting to be the time of year when all I can think about is whether or not to take the plunge and buy a SAD lamp. It’s dark at 4 p.m., and so cold the only way to walk is with your entire face buried in your clothes. So when we arrived at Kenzo’s pre-fall viewing/lookbook shoot surrounded by curtains of colorful, stringed beads, reflecting light around the room (very elevated-Claire’s circa late ’90s), we felt instantly uplifted. Off to the far end of the room, were models shooting the lookbook in real time. Then, moments later, the images were posted to a wall amongst the clothes on mannequins, giving a sense of the process behind a collection.

Humberto Leon, one half of the design team behind the uber-cool Kenzo, (and Opening Ceremony), created with Carol Lim, can relate to that doldrums-y-uninspired feeling forecasts like the ones this week can inspire.

“It’s just about owning your favorite jacket, whether it’s a parka or a shearling coat. It’s just about having that staple warm coat and putting anything with it.

“I always kind of liked the idea of buying men’s winter jackets for themselves. I always thought it was such a great idea because you get the volume, and an immediate kind of coolness.”

Pro-tip, obviously. After all, A men’s outerwear jacket, oversized already, means room for your four different sweaters underneath.

Leon noted that the collection is based around hidden languages–evident in many ways, but particularly a pair of bad-ass hieroglyphic-printed wide-legged trousers.

Note the furry clogs.

“The Kenzo language is always about color and brightness,” Leon says. Take a look. It’s a language we want to speak.