Couture fall 2025 just closed in Paris, and what a season it was. Between the rainy downpours and brilliantly bright, sunny days, hours were filled with one surprise and delight after another. Our strange times call for surreal outlooks, and designers certainly delivered enough fantasy to keep us dreaming for the next six months, until couture rises again in January 2026. Here, the top couture fall 2025 trends.
Couture Fall 2025 Trends:
Jewelry transcends clothing
Embellishment at couture, we know. But this season, sequins, embroidery and over-the-top opulence transcended the usual and became the extreme. At Zuhair Murad, Georges Hobeika and Tamara Ralph, all three brands showcased dresses literally dripping with pearl beads. At Armani Privè, a client was encased in a pearl dress with an ASMR effect front row. At Schiaparelli, jewelry was as much an essential as the dreamy silhouettes created with fabric. Think: the crystalized, beating heart attached to the back of a dress, or the massive crystal collar shield that fell over an angular, strapless black gown.
Weird medieval times
Glenn Martens mentioned 16th century gothic medieval culture as his main inspiration for his Margiela collection. Elsewhere, Iris Van Herpen and Georges Hobeika referenced the aesthetic through 15th century sleeves and old world hair. Not couture related, but the designer Mia Vesper recently hosted a medieval inspired house warming party. On TikTok the “weird medieval” aesthetic is trending with a couple dedicated accounts – it’s different than what one may usually think of when it comes to medieval because it’s more glam, eccentric and fantasy inspired with a hint of grunge; always related to high fashion.
Hands and fingers! Freaky anatomy
Fashion can’t get enough of the hand! Designers revealed the fingers and created fake versions of arms, hands and hearts. Robert Wunn wowed the crowd with his puzzle-like juxtaposed gowns with faux hands and arms, clasping a fake flower in front of the heart, reaching up through a crystalized veil and outstretched holding the bulk of a ball skirt. It created a surreal, otherworldly effect, as the models looked like they had four arms in most cases. “This collection seeks to define the purpose of fashion as it is associated with the act of dressing, emphasizing the significance of these rituals during pivotal life moments,” cited the show notes. One of our favorite details of Glenn Martens’s Margiela debut was the small pockets where fingertips peeked out, covered in a casing of brilliant hot pink! Schiaparelli’s aforementioned beating heart also falls into this trend category.
Padded, contorted bodies
Aside from the brilliant and literal use of surreal anatomy in many couture fall 2025 collections, other designers changed the shape of the female form with padding, a trend we’ve been noticing since Margiela’s infamous 2024 couture collection. At Viktor & Rolf, the designer duo introduced over-stuffed, hyper-padded sensations that re-contoured and re-contextualized the body, utilizing 11,500 individually hand-made feathers as the stuffing. Schiaparelli played with padded hips as did Margiela, through corsets applied under plastic dresses. Balenciaga extended the shoulders into power wonders with extreme leather sculpting. Ashi Studios also played with the extreme, bulging hip through intense padding. This trend coincides with another recent trend which is celebrity transparency about plastic surgery and body alterations (See Kylie Jenner now disclosing exactly what work she got done), which makes it especially interesting.
Dramatic personality hats
We love a hat in the world of couture. This season, designers excelled at just that. Armani topped off almost every single look with a mighty little beret or dramatic oblong topper. Robert Wunn was also incredibly notable for the sculpted, wow-worthy chapeaus. Even Schiaparelli engaged in fun, little sculptural hats. And of course, it wouldn’t be couture week without a little bit of magic from milliner Stephen Jones, who designed the intense, sky-high feathered creations at Viktor & Rolf and the show-stopping veils at Rahul Mishra. Hats are always famous at couture. But this season, they slid into the category of art even more. Consider it the personality-maker du jour.
Photos courtesy of brands//
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