Fashion

As rising populism threatens freedom of expression, designers can no longer look away. Yohji Yamamoto rages, with clothes scorched by the sun. Issey Miyake celebrates the power of shadow. Jeanne Friot indicts the politicians. The Institut Français de la Mode urges its students to push beyond limits. KML, the Saudi-born label, dismantles Western dress codes. All of them are asking the same question...

Is fashion still subversive? The answer is yes, with the extraordinarily named Matières Fécales label. At Yohji Yamamoto, it's yes, but more delicately. Satoshi Kondo for Issey Miyake, meanwhile, advocates for movement without constraints. Historian-performer Olivier Saillard elevates everyday clothing with his Living Fashion Museum. Lilia Litkovska, from Ukraine, draws inspiration from her war-to...

Wars, conflicts, the rise of populism, and the meteoric advance of artificial intelligence – in a world full of uncertainty, how and why can we continue to create new fashion collections? Students from the French Fashion Institute (IFM), along with emerging designers Weinsanto, Pressiat, Maitrepierre, and Alain Paul, share their perspectives. As Xavier Romatet, IFM’s Director General, says: fashio...

Across the discipline, designers are breathing fresh perspectives into Haute Couture. Kevin Germanier repurposes Berluti outfits worn by the French Olympic team. Stéphane Rolland encourages model Farnoush Hamidian to talk out about her native Iran. Julien Fournié extols the virtues of diversity. Yuima Nakazato battles AI with dresses made of ceramics. Charlie le Mindu makes masterpieces from hair....

For some designers, fashion is less about clothes themselves, and more about what those clothes can convey. They see fashion as primarily a political endeavour, a means of challenging a status quo that too often seeks to erase the individual for the alleged benefit of the social order. They champion diversity, gender fluidity and disruption. Jeanne Friot, Walter van Beirendonck, Ahmed Hassan, Loui...

This special report zooms in on the smaller fashion houses that sparkled during Paris Fashion Week. Vincent Pressiat, like Victor Weinsanto, looked to the past, when the king's favourites ruled the roost. Alain Paul recalled his first auditions as a young dancer. Ukrainian Lilia Litkovska is still designing, despite the war. Last but not least, Afro-Caribbean designers were celebrated at the Paris...

Raising awareness about the fragility of our oceans, our land and our Indigenous heritage is the challenge facing a new generation of couturiers. For autumn-winter 2025/26, Iris van Herpen has created a living dress, Imane Ayissi wants the Earth to regenerate naturally, Grace Lillian Lee is celebrating her Australian ancestors and Stéphane Rolland has opened up a dialogue with music. As for Clara...

Whether it involves making space for the trans community, raising awareness about conflicts in Ukraine and Palestine, expressing their distrust of conventional conservative attitudes or funding scientific research that has nothing to do with the fashion industry, Jeanne Friot, Rick Owens, Issey Miyake, Walter van Beirendonck and Agnès b. are all deeply committed to their causes. FRANCE 24 takes a...

To create a fashion collection, you need three key elements: silhouette, colour, material – be it for clothes or accessories. Yet these ingredients are lifeless without the discourse and the incredible stories that transform them into objects of desire. Stories told with sincerity, from Marine Serre’s Lynchian ambitions to Lilia Litkovska’s resolve to work while the bombs are falling; Fashion Week...

Togo's International Fashion Festival has chosen a topical theme for its twelfth edition: the fight against cancer. The issue may not appear glamorous, but the alarming rise in cancer rates makes it extremely relevant. Jacques Logoh, the festival's founder, believes that fashion must help raise awareness of the disease, with prevention as its watchword. As such, some 40 designers from 25 countries...

The collective show from the international students of the Institut Français de la Mode kicks off the autumn-winter 2025/26 presentations and asks contemporary questions. How can a disruptive society impact a creative process that is seeped in societal evolutions such as artificial intelligence? Meanwhile, Victor Weinsanto defends trans people, Vincent Pressiat celebrates Pierre Soulages and Maria...

What do designers Olivier Saillard, Kevin Germanier, Stéphane Rolland, Khol by Hamza Guelmouss and Valentin Nicot as well as Julien Fournié all have in common? They are reinventing the notion of haute couture, often in an artistic, aesthetic way, while being mindful of environmental issues and respectful of their elders. It's a question of playful modernisation; a snapshot of a politically-conscio...

Designers Jeanne Friot, Walter Van Beirendonck and Louis Gabriel Nouchi have taken a stand to defend gender-neutral fashion, calling for inclusion rather than exclusion. Meanwhile, Japanese labels Issey Miyake and Yohji Yamamoto propose a simple, comfortable wardrobe, underpinned with poetry. All of these designers have opted for extraordinary fabrics to create their latest collections. FRANCE 24...

In 2025's uncertain climate and amid international crises, luxury industries are questioning their model: how to meet ever more ambitious financial targets? How can creativity inspire people to dream? Solutions are offered up by feminist designer Maria Grazia Chiuri’s take on Alice and her wonderland, while irresistible Dutch duo Viktor & Rolf make fun of AI and the sparkling Japanese couturier Yu...

Luxury fashion is big business. To stay relevant, big luxury houses and independent labels alike know to constantly refresh their communication strategies. Celebrity endorsement still holds enormous sway, but the clothes themselves need to tell a story. Today, that story is increasingly one of liberté, égalité and fraternité! For proof, look no further than the latest collections from Louis Vuitto...

At more than 80 years old, Yohji Yamamoto still enjoys reassembling fabric like a child. At Issey Miyake, Satoshi Kondo offers a collection inspired by traditional Japanese papermaking. The Franco-Japanese designer Tatiana Quard creates silhouettes with intersecting tubes and lines. This as the Togo International Fashion Festival hosts its second-ever foreign edition. In the 1980s, Paris welcomed...

Fashion's avant garde is at its most creative when it looks to the outside world for inspiration. For next summer's ready-to wear-looks, Victor Weinsanto, responsible for the daring looks we saw at the Paris Olympics opening ceremony, pays tribute to drag queens. Vincent Pressiat and Kevin Germanier, an upcycling evangelist who oversaw the closing ceremony costumes, embrace a similar celebratory a...

A celebration of the body, dance, art and sport! At Dior, Maria Grazia Chiuri installs Italian archer-artist Sagg Napoli in a long glass cage. Her collection is an ode to the Amazons, a reference to the designs created by Christian Dior in the 1950s. For his “Impro” collection, designer Alain Paul unleashes the bodies of male and female dancers on the stage of the Théâtre du Châtelet. Last but not...

At the Rodin Museum Dior presents its latest collection against a décor comprised of mosaics by the New York-based feminist artist Faith Ringgold. At the Salle Pleyel, Stéphane Rolland celebrates the poetry of Jacques Prévert and Brassaï, while at the Palais de Tokyo Japanese couturier Yuima Nakazato works with Belgian choreographer Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui. Couture may officially be considered an app...

Can fashion transform reality, or is it more a question of how the real world influences fashion? Dior's response lies in a deeply feminist collection, inspired by the Swinging Sixties, when Marc Bohan was at the helm of the label. South African brand Maxhosa resurrects ancient Xhosa motifs. Mossi, through his clothes and fashion school in the eastern Paris suburbs, hopes to give disenfranchised y...

At the campus of the French Fashion Institute, 27 design students from 13 different countries are gearing up to present their year's work before a highly influential audience. The stakes are high: these students are poised to compete with fellow graduates from the prestigious Central Saint Martins school in London. But there's no denying that France still plays an outsized role on the internationa...

Stella McCartney, Marine Serre and Lilia Litkovska are three designers united in their belief that fashion, a notoriously polluting industry that often encourages excessive consumption, can itself be part of the solution. Through their latest ready-to-wear collections for next autumn and winter they showcase more sustainable modes of production, and advocate for fashion that has both style and hea...

What exactly goes on in designers’ heads? Wim Wenders claims that Yohji Yamamoto has the power to heal people without the need for a therapist’s chair. Meanwhile Jeanne Friot delves into her own lesbian love story. Stéphane Rolland invites students from two Paris fashions schools on stage, as his collection questions the relationship between East and West. And Julien Fournié embraces the Hitchcock...

Haute couture represents the apotheosis of fashion. Thousands of hours of work can go into a single item, destined to be worn just once. Couture offers a window into a multi-billion-euro industry. But it's also a pillar of French soft power, which was perfectly expressed this year at Dior, Imane Ayissi, Sara Chraïbi and Simone Rocha for Jean Paul Gaultier. FRANCE 24 takes you to check out the runw...