Normcore Never Died. It Just Got More Expensive.

In Paris, prosaic clothes endure, just polished into something more arresting.

It was after a sublime Auralee runway show on Tuesday, when the designer, Ryota Iwai, told a fleet of journalists that this collection was — as they always are — inspired by daily life, that it hit me: These clothes work because they’re advanced normcore.

If I were to give you a flat description of what Mr. Iwai shows, you’d think I was describing the closet of a suburban dad: gray zip-up hoodies, pullover fleeces, a puffer vest, banker blue button-ups and wan bluejeans.

The Auralee show, and others from the first blush of Paris men’s fashion week, swirled with the ghosts of normcore, that aughts movement of wearing pedestrian, mundane clothes as an anti-fashion declaration. Normcore burned bright and fast. It was snuffed out by the steroidal jolt of Instagrammable fashions: your look-at-me trompe l’oeil jeans and your leopard sneakers.

But what if normcore didn’t die. What if it just mutated? In Paris, the prosaic is still there, though it has been polished into something if not more luxurious, at least more interesting.

Look at Auralee, where Mr. Iwai is a master at making the familiar feel arresting. His flannels come cumulus soft, his fleeces are plush enough to make a Patagonia wilt and his corduroys are tailored to utopian perfection.