I don’t design clothes,” Mr Ralph Lauren once declared. “I design dreams.” If that’s true, then he must reserve his sweetest dreams for the Purple Label collection, available on MR PORTER this season. This signature menswear line, which made its debut in 1994, is the ultimate expression of Mr Lauren’s vision for an aspirational lifestyle.

Born in 1939 to Jewish immigrant parents and raised in the Bronx, New York, Mr Lauren’s journey from humble beginnings to the US’s pre-eminent designer is the embodiment of the rags-to-riches American Dream. The secret to his success is not just in the clothes he creates, but in the rich, all-encompassing fantasy world he builds around them. Polo Ralph Lauren, for instance, was a line designed to evoke the uptown glamour associated with the sport, while RRL – pronounced “double RL” and named after the Colorado ranch Mr Ralph Lauren owns with his wife, Ms Ricky Lauren – is all Navajo-print blankets, flannel overshirts and rugged denim that evokes the romance of the Old West.

It is with Purple Label, however, that Mr Lauren really allows his fantasies to run wild. Originally intended as a Savile Row-inspired formal tailoring line, it was redefined a couple of seasons ago to include a wider range of outerwear and casualwear. This season’s standout pieces range from a dramatic, knee-length double-breasted shearling coat to a heavily patterned silk-jacquard dinner jacket, reflecting a vision of masculine style that runs the gamut from rugged outdoorsman to high-society VIP. But while the brand’s remit has expanded outside the boardroom, nothing has been compromised in terms of sophistication. Even the so-called basics – hoodies, cable-knit sweaters and cotton-pique polo shirts – have been elevated to high luxury.

The enduring popularity of the Ralph Lauren brand owes a great deal to the fact that the clothes themselves are enduring. “The kinds of clothes I design are the kinds of things I believe in – the kinds of things that last for ever,” Mr Lauren once claimed. “I love things that stay.” Ralph Lauren Purple Label, in particular, embodies this claim. It feels as though the clothes were designed to last for decades and beyond. It’s only fitting, then, that the collection should be modelled by a man with real pedigree.

Mr Werner Schreyer, 46, has spent half his life modelling, ever since he did his first gig for a furniture store in his native Vienna. That’s long enough, you’d expect, for him to have learned a thing or two about style. From his early GUESS campaigns alongside 1990s wild-child Ms Drew Barrymore, when he was compared by many photographers to a young Mr James Dean, to more recent editorial campaigns for brands such as Louis Vuitton and Hugo Boss, he has established himself as a true icon of the industry. If anyone has earned the right to prefix the word “super” to his job title, it’s him.