Miu Miu went very Mad Men, mixing workwear looks with ‘just got home from a night out’ vibes, while at Chanel, bows were very big news.
It’s been a pretty eclectic Paris Fashion Week (March 3-11). We’ve had Victoria Beckham turn a dressing gown into a dreamily draped top, Sarah Burton put her stamp on Givenchy, and witty Dutch designer Duran Lantink – tipped to take over at Jean Paul Gaultier – sent a male model down the runway wearing prosthetic breasts.
The final day of the festivities will close out with Saint Laurent’s latest collection tonight, but first, Chanel and Miu Miu shared their womenswear ready-to-wear lines for fall/winter 2025/26.
CHANEL
Chanel got the day underway in a vast white space, the models threading their way around a gigantic black ribbon – a nod to the bows that defined practically every outfit on display. Not just decorating necklines, a hip-length puffer jacket was even belted with multiple bows and a seemingly pleather cowboy getup swapped classic tassels for yet more bows.
The collection was designed by the Chanel studio team. Matthieu Blazy joined the brand in December as artistic director from Bottega Veneta, but his first Chanel show isn’t expected until September. So this is something of an interim collection.
Founded by the complicated, brilliant Gabrielle ‘Coco’ Chanel, Chanel is still bound up with the late Karl Lagerfeld’s almost 40-year tenure. Quilted purses, the luxe CC logo, little black dresses, prim woven two-piece suits with gilt buttons – the Chanel look and colour palette (so much black, white and gold, the odd flash of red) are as classic as Chanel no.5.
This season black and white, of course, continued to dominate. Suits were overlaid with ethereal tulle dresses, Victorian ruffles wafted up and down the runway and Elizabeth I-like, round necks. Bags shrank from huge A3-size clutches in red leather and colossal strings of pearls lung crossbody, to tiny golden-snitches on thin chains.
There were arguably too many bows, and few of the looks really stuck in your brain, but the whole thing was undeniably Chanel.
MIU MIU
Next up, Miu Miu took over the historic Palais d’Iéna in Paris, an incredible round building that inside, was done up in gaudy yellow walls, with cream Grecian columns flanking the runway.
Models that, although were your classic giraffes in size and shape, also included men and a very welcome range in ages – there was grey hair in there! Plus, stars including Lou Doillon and Gigi Hadid, who was in an almost frumpy, oversized black buttoned overcoat.
Fur was declared back – in stoles slung over handbags, and on collars – pullovers should be worn layered, with diagonal half-zips, and earrings should be massive enough to weigh down your earlobes, and gold.
Launched, and still run, by Italian designer Miuccia Prada in the early Nineties, Miu Miu is the impish, more light-hearted alternative to the grown-up world of Prada proper. The brand’s looks tend to be droll, quirky, bold, with lots of fun and a retro edge to them.
The summer 2025 collection was like a Seventies-Nineties mash-up, with models wearing multiple jangling belts and boob tubes over shirts.
This season, the boob tubes were out. Instead, it was all about skinny, long-sleeved t-shirts, collarbones on display and slacks worn very long in bright green, yellow and greys. There was a Sixties workwear feel to the trousers and jackets especially, as well as the fur accents and super shiny short dresses, while the colours – oranges, umbers, pale blues and tweedy browns – smacked of the Seventies.
There was also a running theme of looking slightly undressed and dishevelled, like the models had been up dancing all night – straps hanging down and buttoned-up cardigans yanked down below collarbones.
On the FROW, there was Emma Corrin, who’s previously modelled for Miu Miu, in a pink shirt, while Anora actor Mark Eydelshteyn donned a dark grey buttoned cardigan over a dark-striped tee and loose navy trousers, with angular tortoiseshell sunglasses.
Emma Mackey from Sex Education looked quite skater boi in long cropped black shorts and plaits, while White Lotus actress Sydney Sweeney brought the glam in a boxy brown leather jacket.
Another medley of a show, but what was obvious is, you’d better start wearing knee-high socks in lilacs and maroons.
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