Above (L-R): Simone Rocha, Bottega Veneta, Peter Do, Prada
Boring, or wearable? That was the question on everyone’s lips this season as designers, for the most part, advocated for a quieter approach to dressing. Of course, there were decriers—Moschino, celebrating its 40th birthday without a creative director but plenty of camp, and Rei Kawakubo at Comme des Garçons, who envisioned happiness as 18 lysergic balls of colour—but the overarching attitude was not maximalist. Palettes were largely neutral, shifting from blacks and whites to Saharienne browns; in rethinking the everyday wardrobe, designers created clean, modular silhouettes, from pants that could unzip at the knee, to knit dresses you could unbutton into a two-piece, or three.
Pencil skirts under hoodies, jersey pyjamas worn with slippers—as The Cut’s Cathy Horyn writes, many brands these days seem preoccupied with the look of “unostentatious wealth”, increasingly conceptualising ‘fashion’ as synonymous with ‘luxury’. A majority of spring/summer 2024 continued to point in this direction, though the closing days triggered a shift to something shot through with glee. At Rabanne, warriors jangled in modern chainmail as they strode down the runway. And at Rick Owens, so often the picture of darkness, there were plumes of sherbet colour—sugary pinks and yellows that spoke of a turn to joy.
As always, there were throughlines from previous seasons. Sheer fabrics, now a staple, appeared at Sacai, Louis Vuitton and Stella McCartney, along with fringing at Gucci and Bottega Veneta. Also making a return were supermodels of eras past, seizing the present—Shalom Harlow and Amber Valetta at Schiaparelli, Claudia Schiffer at Versace, Naomi Campbell, Lisa Kebede, Malgosia Bela and Jessica Stam. It sent the message, as Vogue Australia’s fashion features director Alice Birrell tells us from Paris, “that the so-called use-by date for models is out of date”—ironically, a long overdue idea.
Spring/summer 2024 closed with two farewells: that of Gabriela Hearst at Chloé and Sarah Burton at Alexander McQueen, whose final shows were equal parts giddy and emotional. But it was also peppered with ascensions, like Peter Hawkings at Tom Ford, Peter Do at Helmut Lang and Sabato de Sarno at Gucci.
The old guard and the new, the quiet and the loud: this season was anchored in duality. Here, we break down the 6 key trends to know from the spring/summer 2024 runways.
