Travel broadens the mind, or so the old adage goes. But with 2020 set to go down in history as “The Year We All Stayed At Home”, where do we look for the inspiration, the enlightenment and the sense of adventure that usually lurks along paths untrodden and in places unknown?

For the travel-starved, there are ways of simulating the experience that don’t involve stepping outside of your front door: literature, art, film and food all have the power to convey a sense of place. But clothes can transport us, too – and there are few fashion designers better at doing this than Sir Paul Smith.

The veteran British designer is the very definition of a well-travelled man, having spent much of the last four decades on the road while overseeing the expansion of his global network of retail stores. (He estimates having visited one of his key markets, Japan, more than a hundred times.)

These are not just business trips; they fuel Sir Paul’s creativity, too. The designer, an endlessly curious man, never travels without his camera, and the photographs he captures – many of which can be found on his personal Instagram account, @paulsmith – provide the foundations for his namesake brand’s collections. “I work through observation, through travel, through the photographs I take when I’m away,” he told MR PORTER last year.

And the forthcoming collection is no exception, having been inspired by a walking trip Sir Paul took last year to the Andean Mountains of Chile, whose vibrant, mineral-rich slopes – “there are [many] different types of minerals in the mountains,” he recalls – have been transformed into a collection of suits, shorts and short-sleeved shirts now available on MR PORTER.

These rich mineral deposits manifest themselves in a spectrum of vivid shades, from coppery reddish-brown to lavender and turquoise, which are painted in broad streaks across the mountains; these colours are complemented by the emerald and mossy greens of the local flora and the intense blue of the Pacific Ocean.

If this otherworldly landscape provided the colour palette for this collection, the canvas, at least, was a little more familiar. For all that Paul Smith brings a global aspect to its collections, it remains rooted in a sense of Britishness; Sir Paul first set up shop in 1970 in Nottingham, England, and has largely stuck to the formula of colourful tailoring – inspired by Savile Row, but with a wry sense of humour – that first brought his brand international recognition.

Tailoring comes in a wool-blend fabric with a touch of mohair that adds a delicate sheen to the material, or a lightweight cotton which, while hardly suitable for hiking in the Andes, is better suited for warmer weather. Rounding out the collection is a range of smartly tailored shorts, cut to finish just above the knee, and satiny camp-collar pyjama shirts printed with exotic botanicals.

And while none of this has the power to magically transport you to the Chilean Andes, it might just broaden your style horizons.

Shop Paul Smith here