The stock market is in flux, Lady Gaga just dropped the song of the year, and red carpets are seeing an influx of bandage dresses. History really does repeat itself.
On April 8, Hailey Bieber attended the Fashion Trust U.S Awards 2025 in Los Angeles, dressed in recession indicator fashion at its most elegant. While the rest of Hollywood was busy reviving Ugg boots, bootcut jeans, and the Chloé Paddington bag, Bieber went for a 2008-era trend that dominated red carpets in the mid-aughts.
In lieu of her usual LBD or leather bomber jacket, the model chose a floor-length bandage dress, the likes of which "haven't been seen en masse since the first Obama Administration," as Marie Claire's Senior Fashion and Beauty News Editor Halie LeSavage so aptly put it. Hervé Léger was the first designer to go all-in on skintight, stretchy dresses in the late 1990s. By the mid-2000s, they became a bona fide trend with buy-in from the era's biggest stars: Lindsay Lohan, Kim Kardashian, and so on.
Though the number's bodycon fit and dusty mauve shade look authentically 2000s, Bieber's gown isn't an archival pull at all. It's actually a new release, designed by Saint Laurent's current creative director Anthony Vaccarello. He expertly utilized more modern details, like a long chiffon skirt and racy cut-outs, to make the relic feel more apropos of the time.
As usual, Bieber kept any additional styling to a minimum. She forwent the red carpet clutch that would have once accompanied such a look, styling only with a few diamond rings. Her hair, meanwhile was done in natural-looking waves, with barely-there makeup.
Bieber isn't the first to resurrect this long-lost trend. Kaia Gerber beat her to the punch, long before the tariff-induced financial panic. Back in September of 2024, the second-generation model sported an ivory bandage dress of her own—a recreation of her mother Cindy Crawford's 1993 Oscars look.
With recession-era trends making a large-scale comeback, I think it's safe to say we'll be seeing even more skintight bandage dresses before the year is up.
