Demna Bids Farewell to a Decade at Balenciaga with the Fall/Winter 2025 Couture Collection

On July 9, Demna presented his final show as the creative director of Balenciaga. The venue was none other than the house’s historic couture atelier on Avenue George V in Paris. In this familiar setting where he spent years shaping the brand, Demna poetically marked both the end of an era and the beginning of a new chapter.

The show delivered a deeply emotional and experimental collection, fusing the maison’s historical codes with the glamorous aesthetic of old Hollywood—hallmarks of Demna’s design language. Kim Kardashian took to the runway in an ivory slip dress and a white feathered fur coat, adorned with Lorraine Schwartz diamond jewelry once owned by the late Elizabeth Taylor, embodying the mood of the collection.

In the audience were Nicole Kidman, Katy Perry, Salma Hayek, and Cardi B, whose presence added star power to the occasion.

Meanwhile, on the runway, models such as Eliza Douglas and Minttu Vesala—longtime collaborators of Demna—took center stage, symbolizing the decade of Balenciaga’s creative duality between classicism and experimentation. Instead of music, the soundtrack featured the reading of first names of Demna’s atelier staff, paying tribute to the unnamed artisans behind the scenes who supported his creative vision.

At the heart of the collection was a reinterpretation of la bourgeoisie dress codes. In a bold departure from traditional haute couture, corset structures were deliberately omitted. Instead, multiple layers of fabric were hand-applied over a stretch base, resulting in garments that floated around the body rather than clinging to it, yielding an architectural silhouette. It was a reinvention of the relationship between structure and the body, breathing contemporary life into classic forms.

For the menswear looks, Demna collaborated with four family-owned Neapolitan tailoring houses to produce unstructured shirt-jackets. Their signature rounded shoulders and fluid construction brought a fresh perspective on comfort within Balenciaga’s couture framework.

One standout story from the show involved Demna sending a bodybuilder friend to Naples four times to have custom suits made to his muscular proportions. Based on those patterns, nine suits in different materials were produced and worn by male models of varying body types, visually expressing Demna’s core belief: “The body defines the garment, not the other way around.”

In the latter half of the show, the glamour of Hollywood’s golden age came alive through an opulent off-white gown draped entirely in fur and a dazzling diva dress covered in black sequins. A debutante dress in the world’s lightest technical organza followed, in soft pink, as well as minimalist yet refined versions in blue and yellow, highlighting the delicate beauty of form and material.

For the finale, Demna unveiled his culminating masterpiece: a conical high-neck gown crafted from guipure lace, constructed without a single visible seam using advanced millinery techniques. It stood as the bridal symbol of couture—an emblem of his bond with Paris, and a fitting conclusion to this creative journey.

In this way, the Demna era at Balenciaga came to a close with both grandeur and intimacy. On the same day, the exhibition “Balenciaga by Demna” at Kering’s Paris headquarters also concluded. The retrospective explored his decade-long tenure (2015–2025), shedding light on the key themes and creative philosophies he brought to the house.

Next, Demna is set to take the helm at Gucci—a brand that has recently seen slowing sales. The fashion world now eagerly anticipates how Demna will apply his unique aesthetic and philosophy to reimagine the future of Gucci.

Explore all the looks from the Balenciaga Fall/Winter 2025 Haute Couture collection in the gallery below.

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