Stuart Vevers’ Winter Collection Nails Youth-tinged Holiday Optimism With Winter Cozy

Shhh, don’t tell Mickey Mouse, but Stuart Vevers has found a new favorite cartoon character: Popeye.

The creative director of Coach, who has long used Disney characters in his line, mixed it up for his winter ’25 collection, emblazoning the beefy sailor in black-and-white on a variety of oversize lofty sweaters and ripped T-shirts with “love worn finishes” inspired by a famous photo of Debbie Harry from 1978. In some of the illustrations, Popeye is carrying a Coach Tabby bag, bringing the vintage image to life.

Vevers said he characterizes this collection as winter rather than resort or holiday because the young shopper he is targeting isn’t jetting off to some exotic locale around Christmas. “It’s an important distinction,” the designer said. “The Coach gang is mostly not on a cruise or at a resort.”

Instead, they’re looking for cozy, comfortable clothes to wear when the weather gets chilly. Toward that end, Vevers filled the collection with oversize sustainable cardigans, knit leggings, patterned pajamas and other pieces that answer that call.

“It’s the biggest knit season we’ve ever had,” the designer said. “It definitely comes from a point of view of dressing, which knitwear gives us. It’s about the ease, coziness and comfort, and I see that strongly in the current generation, that shifts away from formality.”

Case in point: Vevers continued to hit the nail on the head of the younger generation’s preferred types of dress. For instance, he sees a lot of teenagers walking around New York wearing pajamas, so he offered up his version which included one plaid model with a tuxedo stripe running down the leg. That same plaid was used in a boxer short, styled with a boxy leather jacket and new shearling-lined “slippers” (designed with street-friendly soles).

He mixed the cozy argyle, cable-knit and intarsia knits with irreverent, girly party clothes, such as raw-hemmed slip lace tank tops and dresses, or voluminous, taffeta and tweed skirts from the fall runway, now rendered in holiday-spirited plaids or with flocked velvet polka dots and stripes. He continued to push the message with crystal pavé heirloom bow brooches and reissued 1969 Kisslock Frame oversized bags (in knit and leather) with more playful keychains and jewelry (including a Halloween pumpkin and a gingerbread man) — evoking the popular, cooly spontaneous mix of vintage and modern wardrobing youths are drawn to.

While many of the oversize sweaters and pajama bottoms could be worn by both genders, there were a couple of pieces targeted exclusively to men, including a 1950s-inspired leather coat and black leather bomber jackets.

One of the standout pieces was a pair of garment-dyed “tuxedo” pajamas complete with satin detailing. “We’re taking the preciousness out of things,” Vevers said.