Paris Menswear AW25 Standouts

Dior

By far the standout of the menswear shows in Paris, Dior Men’s AW25 by creative director Kim Jones was the talk of the town. Exploring menswear’s more decadent history and silhouetted,  Kim explained the collection as representing “the shift from something quite ornate and extravagant in the eighteenth century to something more linear and utilitarian in the nineteenth, with the beginnings of modern menswear.” Depicting this sartorial transition through the ages, traditional elements of menswear were transformed with theatrical accents, eg. drama! Trousers took on exaggerated volume, looking much more like billowing skirts, while opera coats and cinched waists, paired with knotted satin visors played with the Casanova figure. Resting inspiration on the dual sense of the ‘ladies man’, the collection married feminine and masculine elements, mining the archives to come with the most striking silhouettes befitting a designer who received the Chevalier de la Légion d’Honneur, France’s highest civilian honour.

Lemaire

Because of the strong brand identity that Christopher Lemaire and Sarah-Linh Tran have established with their brand (reportedly turning over more than $100 million according to BoF last week), they have managed to play and upend the sartorial codes within their world. For the AW25 show in Paris, the collection exhibited a certain kineticism as hems were twisted and skirts ballooned out and cut back in above the ankles. Playing with layers length, the Lemaire pair cut lines asymmetrically and allowed longer dresses to billow out from beneath cropped jackets. Lemaire has managed to create desirable  accessories alongside their ready-to-wear pieces, and for this show collaborated with the studio of famed Austrian craftsman, Carl Auböck, designing magnifying glass necklaces that hung from model’s necks. Perhaps inviting further inspection into the final details of the show? Leather came out on top as the favourite fabric for the collection, taking the shape of sling bags, knotted bandanas and trousers that bunched at the ankles. Lemaire isn’t trying to reinvent the wheel, but instead they hone in on the details they have mastered and extend from within them, utilising a more “why fix what isn’t broken?” attitude when it comes to design.

Kiko

At Kiko Kostadinov, the wackier elements that have come to define the brand were tampered down for his AW25 show. Of course, a couple of looks carried that elfin approach to design that has come to be a signature for the Bulgarian creative director, however, the overall vibe of the show certainly felt like we were witnessing a more mature man coming to the brand. Funnelled neck coats and hooded jackets featured rows of chunky buttons and shining embellishment details. Shirting was deployed throughout and incorporated canine-esque collars and striped fabrics, often paired with matching striped trousers. Debuting a new shoe shape, the AW25 show featured mid-calf tabi boots with a chunky rubber sole designed in black and dark teal and chocolate brown. Colour palettes were still slightly left field, styling was not for the faint of heart and pockets were plentiful as ever. So yes, while the Kiko man is growing up, he still maintains the idiosyncrasies that shape such a unique personal style. 

Sacai 

From the hair, to the styling, to the graphic motifs, there was a real sense of the wilderness at Sacai’s AW25 show this season. With minimal makeup and teased hair, models looked somewhat like they were fashionably dragged backwards through a bush. With fur permeating many of the collections this season, Sacai’s furry vision was deployed across shaggy mohair trims and cuffs and huge stomping boots made in collaboration with Ugg, adding a somewhat animalistic quality to the vibe of the show. Sticking with the primitive theme, varsity jackets, t-shirts and knitwear featured ‘Where the Wild Things are’ slogans and characters, incorporating a quite literal reference to the whimsical wilderness the collection was rooted in. Workwear also featured quite heavily, with Sacai’s latest collaboration with Carharrt. Patent leather and heavy cotton work jackets were reconfigured in classic Sacai style, with huge pockets jutting off the sides and chunky knit panelling applied to the sleeves and collars. Trench coats were still very much buttoned to the top and despite the brands forays into suiting, the outdoorsy informality was still worked into the overall silhouettes.