That was fashion month, a delirious relay from Milan to Paris, espresso replacing blood, a suitcase full of half-ironed looks and receipts from every café with “Maison” in the name. I’ve eaten my weight in pomme purée and steak haché, and I swear I’m starting to think in subtitles. (The cure: cold soba at Abri. A revelation. Go.)
Before Paris stole the show, Milan had already shifted the temperature. Dario Vitale’s debut at Versace detonated any idea that the house would keep coasting on glamour autopilot. The clothes looked hot to the touch—slashed muscle-tees, zippers half-undone, backs exposed. It wasn’t about polish; it was about friction. You could feel Gianni’s DNA—the danger, the hedonism—but scraped raw for now.
From there, every house in Paris arrived like it had something to prove, or maybe something to exorcise. What’s emerging now isn’t a trend so much as a tension—between reverence and rebellion, between the archive and the algorithm. Call it Hot Archive Summer (recession indicator). Fashion reheating its own historic nachos, letting it bubble and burn until something new seeps through. Sometimes it’s delicious. Other times, it probably tastes better when you’re drunk.
By the time Paris wound down, one thing was clear. No one wants to live in the past, but everyone’s afraid to leave it behind. Designers are trying to make history feel wearable again. But they’re quoting, not conversing. And they’re terrified of the comment section, the side-by-sides, the instant verdicts. You can feel it in the clothes. Fashion used to chase transcendence—now it’s dodging backlash.
Over a champagne (or two) at Mucha Café (which, to us fashion girly pops, read as “Miuccia”), I sat with i-D’s Steff Yotka and The Washington Post’s Rachel Tashjian—my two fashion moms—trying to metabolize the week. We’d just come from Thom Browne and Miu Miu—the latter a show that had everyone chattering about aprons, class, and the blurred line between irony and empathy. Rachel noted, “Whenever someone puts blue-collar clothing on the runway, it’s always interesting. You can tell immediately if it’s done knowingly or not.”
And Steff, never one to undershoot a thesis, added: “Miuccia waded into class at Miu Miu, smartly—the fashion audience is vexed by which class to aspire to. The oligarchs are turning fascist, the bourgeois are out of touch, the middle class is going conservative. Mrs. Prada siding with the working class is a pointed departure from what most luxury houses are doing.”
We talked about how that anxiety—about who fashion is really dressing, and for what fantasy—had seeped into almost every show. As Steff later put it, it’s “a season of unease and change that didn’t result in a supernova of newness.”
This was the season of debuts, yes, but not just new names. New tones. New philosophies. You could feel the tectonic shift in the language of luxury. At Chanel, Matthieu Blazy—hot from his architectural triumphs at Bottega—approached the house like an anthropologist, not a tourist. His first collection wasn’t about quoting Coco; it was about re-sensing her. The tweed suits frayed at their edges, the feathers breathed, the camellias weren’t pinned but alive and in motion. The show, staged under a planetary glow, felt cosmic yet grounded, elegant without the starch.
Thom Bettridge, i-Daddy himself, put it perfectly: “After two weeks chock full of debuts of various levels of quality, Matthieu swooped in at the end and completely shifted the paradigm of what luxury can be today.” And he did—by proving luxury can still whisper but also serve down.
Then there’s Dior, where Jonathan Anderson made his womenswear debut. Instead of bowing to the ghost of the New Look, he picked it apart. The waistlines tilted, the corsets softened, the tailoring wilted just enough to feel human. And denim galore! It was cerebral without being cold. Dior seen through Anderson’s existential lens.
Balenciaga’s debut had weight, but some—okay, most—colors and cuts teetered. A question lingered in the air. Will Pierpaolo Piccioli lean too elegant, too safe? Meghan Markle’s appearance was… interesting. The after-party said as much. We danced to Rihanna’s “Pon de Replay” instead of Demna’s usual underground utz-utz-utz. A signal that the house, and its crowd, are finding a new rhythm.
At Jean Paul Gaultier, Duran Lantink threw his first punch. No polite homage—a full takeover, body and mind. His debut was sexy, weird, fun. It wasn’t drag or nostalgia. It was confrontation. I didn’t love every look, but I loved the nerve.
Loewe, now helmed by Jack McCollough and Lazaro Hernandez, felt like a question mark that might turn into an exclamation point next season. Some pieces sang—coats with sculpted drape, dresses twisted mid-gesture—but others were still finding their frequency (and their language, post-Anderson). Meanwhile, Maison Margiela’s first ready-to-wear under Glenn Martens was both cerebral and sensual. The divisive metal mouthpieces, molded after the house’s four-stitch logo, turned anonymity into ornament, a haunting metaphor for brand identity in an age obsessed with self-display.
Givenchy oscillated between romance and rigor, but yet to find its groove. Miguel Castro Freitas’s debut at Mugler went for shock and spectacle—a nipple dress made fleeting headlines. Celine continues its gentle new phase. And at Chloé, the boho woman has apparently gone to the beach.
Alaïa was almost monastic in its beauty. Pieter Mulier sculpted silence. Clothes that seemed to hover an inch off the body. Those controversial cocooned pieces, arms pinned to form, weren’t restrictive so much as serene. Sorry, internet trolls! Schiaparelli, under Daniel Roseberry, used Surrealism as seasoning rather than showpiece. Kendall Jenner’s closing look sealed it—a rare A-list casting moment that actually felt earned.
McQueen returned to confidence with the infamous bumster, reimagined as an idea rather than an artifact. And Rick Owens, ever the oracle, staged smoke and grace as models waded into the water outside the Palais de Tokyo. Comme des Garçons? A privilege, as always, to witness.
Outside the megabrands and their anxieties about legacy, the independents are defining what’s next. August Barron, the artists formerly known as All-In, delivered the show of the season. It was sharp, tactile, and beautifully unnerving. The after-party was a riot of besties everywhere you turn.
Torishéju, fresh off her LVMH Savoir-Faire prize, built on that mood with a show that radiated confidence and craft. Naomi Campbell’s opening look set the tone, featuring a tailored jacket with the perfect pair of jeans. Menswear is already on my wishlist. And Kiko Kostadinov, by Laura and Deanna Fanning, stayed in a league of its own—sculptural, off-key, and rich with those challenging, delectable colors only they can pull off.
Elsewhere, Abra brought quiet rebellion to Dover Street Market. The kind of stealth power move that cements a cult following. Undercover also opted for a presentation instead of spectacle, reminding everyone that Jun Takahashi doesn’t need a runway to command attention. Paula Canovas del Vas kept things tight with a lookbook that hummed with texture and sly sensuality.
Meanwhile, Fidan Novruzova made her runway debut with a salon-style show that distilled her codes—fluid tailoring, decisive accessories, and those incredible shoes and bags that are already editor bait. Matières Fécales went the other way: opulent chaos with underground energy. Vaquera, never afraid of absurdity, turned volume and velocity into vocabulary. It was punk couture that felt feral, funny, and strangely romantic.
Paris leaves me exhausted, but also, weirdly, hopeful. This wasn’t a season of revolution; it was a season of recalibration. Designers, especially those debuting, deserve a moment to marinate. And we, the audience, should stop demanding reinvention at the pace of a doom scroll. Fashion isn’t an algorithm. It’s a slow burn. Give it time. The things we hate now might seduce us later; the things we adore might curdle by morning. That’s the delicious instability of taste—fickle, fabulous, gloriously unserious.
As for the nachos? They may be reheated, but they’re still hot. And tonight, I’ll be drunk enough to eat every bite.
Alex xx
LVMH Prize winner Soshi Otsuki gave i-D an exclusive interview with Ashley Ogawa Clarke, which comes with an original shoot creative-directed by Ashley’s wife, Reina, and shot by Xiaopeng Yuan.
Vivian Wilson ate down the Ottolinger runway in two very fab looks.
Gabriella Karefa-Johnson showed up to JPG in a custom Prada two-piece—the skirt shortened, the jacket stitched with another of the same jacket—by Thao Huynh. (Check the IG. Receipts are gag-worthy.)
Yohji Yamamoto gave Giorgio Armani a touching tribute on the runway <3.
Under Armour tapped ANTS Live for its Halo campaign.
Thom Browne had aliens take over his show, and one handed me a note that read: “We come in peace.” Theatre.
i-D’s daughter Enza Khoury continues to make us proud, walking Vaquera, Fidan Novruzova, Cecilie Bahnsen, Vivienne Westwood, Lacoste, Vaillant, and Ottolinger.
Too many shows (no names lol) had women speaking as the soundtrack—and not nearly enough Addison Rae.
Richard E. Grant walked the Miu Miu show, and told me backstage that he felt “lit” in his look.
Versace Embodied is exploring the voices of today’s cultural architects from photographer Camille Vivier, artist Collier Schorr, and more.
I agree with so much of this, but I am absolutely amazed that there was no mention of the YSL show which for me was the show of the season managing to manage to walk the line that seems to be this great chasm of difficulty; just being wearability and fantasy colliding. It was the most opulent of all of the shows visually down to set design, of course, and managed to not so much re-create the wheel, but cement the customer and then cater to her with options for a future case in point? How all of the ball gowns could be folded up into a pouch. Those slinky nylon pieces that walked are a perfect example of eroticism that does not require yards of bare skin.
this is so gorgeously quotable