Paris Fashion Week Men's is only a few days in, yet a softer mood has already appeared, best typified by Rick Owens's spectacular white satin draped "army of love".
However, the week opened with a remarkable, follow-that moment courtesy of a Louis Vuitton showcase, which took place on a Damier-checked faux lawn around a giant globe. It will take some beating, but with a few days still to go, it probably will be – and we are luckier for it.
Louis Vuitton
The latest Louis Vuitton show by creative director Pharrell Williams begs the question – is there nothing this man cannot do? Able to read the mood and deliver fully formed propositions we didn’t know we needed, this show, staged at the Unesco headquarters no less, was a languid voyage around a core pillar of the maison: travel.
Called “Le monde est a vous” (roughly meaning “the world is your oyster”) Williams sent out safari-style jackets, silken bomber jackets printed with an image of Earth from space and canny streetwear emblazoned with the logo of fictitious travel company, LV Airlines. Several hand trolleys piled with the famous Louis Vuitton suitcases also graced the runway.
Opening with a parade of all-black looks, before shifting through deep brown and finally ending in pale bone, these muted colours were broken only by flashes of high luxe scattered through the collection. Given the manner of gewgaws on show, it was skilfully underplayed as silken pyjamas were trimmed with pearls, a jacket was scattered with hand-sewn crystals, and a jacket and trousers were cut from grey-on-grey embroidered monogram, with the LV logo shining darkly. There were rich denim cut jackets in exotic skins, a tuxedo with a paillette embellished collar and crystal-covered bags. Serenaded by a live choir, the audience wanted everything on show.
Kenzo
Showing in the Jardin du Palais Royal, artistic director Nigo continued to trawl through the company archive, drawing out elements by founder Kenzo Takada that bind Tokyo to Paris. These subtle nods arrived as a side fastening denim waistcoat, vaguely Japanese-style typography spelling out “Kenzo Paris 1970” (the date and place the label began) on a trench coat and a side closing black suit with a brush drawing of Paris down one side.
The rest of the show was much softer, almost loose, and run-through with Nigo's street style. There were boxy striped linen suits worn with flip-flops, oversized baggy trousers in glossy ox-blood or absinth green, and a recurring bamboo print, seen as a belted trench, skater-style boxy shirt and trousers. Plus, there was plenty of double denim. Breaking this were technical mesh tops, both hooded and otherwise, and elevated with embroidered flowers.
Wales Bonner
Wales Bonner rooted her co-ed spring/summer 2025 collection in black culture via the archive of Althea McNish, a Trinidadian artist who moved to the UK in the 1950s and became the country's first black textile designer.
Filled with stripes, most notable as tone-on-tone oversized shirts, the collection shifted through crisp separates as technical knitted tops, boxy tops, collared shirts, windbreakers, long-line coats and tiny swimming trunks-slash-bikini bottoms that arrived in a deep shade of mulberry.
Other colours included nautical blues and leaf greens, which Bonner mixed with floral patterns lifted straight from McNish’s own clothes, such as a jaunty sunflower print and an oversized violet-coloured poppy, made into boxy tops, shorts and sporty zip jackets.
A sharper edge came via pieces from long-time collaborator, Saville Row’s Anderson and Shepard as crisp tuxedos, satin overcoats and beautifully cut trousers and jackets, many decorated with metal details and embroidered sequins.
A new tie-up with adidas also brought more sequins, such as Samba trainers in black with silver sequins, which were worn with multiple looks.
Rick Owens
Best known for his dark, gothic leanings, Owens instead looked to the Olympics about to engulf Paris and switched tack entirely. Calling on students and staff from Parisian fashion colleges to walk the runway instead of models, he dressed them in white, ivory and cream, in flowing robes and elaborate headdresses. Sending them down the runway in groups – rather than one at a time – it was both weird and beautiful, much like Owens's otherworldly clothes themselves.
What makes Owens such an interesting designer is that he remains true to his vision, regardless of what else is happening around him. He still offered shapes that stretched, disguised and morphed the human body, bulking here, revealing there, but now clad in all pale shades of white, it was like something out of a fever dream.
