The most talked-about collection at the spring/summer 2024 fashion shows was the one that wasn’t there. Phoebe Philo, yet to unveil the first fruits of her eponymous line, which had been originally slated to debut online in September some six years after she departed Céline, dominated the fashion news cycle throughout the month. As the spring/summer 2024 fashion trends piled up, designers waited nervously to see if their collections would be eclipsed by a spontaneous digital drop from a woman many revere as fashion’s messiah.
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Her cult status as industry saviour was only heightened by the news that the spring/summer 2024 show would be Sarah Burton’s last collection for Alexander McQueen, with Gabriela Hearst also departing Chloé. Incoming: Sabato de Sarno at Gucci, Peter Hawkings at Tom Ford, Peter Do at Helmut Lang, and Louise Trotter at Carven. Does fashion have a woman designer problem? At LVMH, the world’s largest luxury conglomerate, only Dior and Pucci have female creative directors, while Stella McCartney and Phoebe Philo are eponymously run. At Kering, the second biggest fashion conglomerate, not a single brand is helmed by a woman, nor a person of colour.
Set against that demoralising disparity, and an equally sobering economic and political backdrop, designers played it safe for spring/summer 2024. The palette was muted, with black and white blotting out the colour-box brights that typically come to the fore for summer collections. Retina-searing red was one of the few tones that managed to make it through the muzzled colour wheel. The post-pandemic era of body positivity – and the nude looks that came with it – has largely faded, and with it the broader variety of body types that had begun to populate the runways.
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Statement gowns are out and discreet chic – buoyed up with wardrobe staples including trench coats, pencil skirts, trouser suits and good jeans – is in. At the fashion search engine Tagwalk, which scanned more than 11,000 images from the spring/summer 2024 shows in New York, London, Milan and Paris, looks that were tagged “minimalism” were up 46 per cent on the previous spring/summer 2023 season. Logo-tagged looks, meanwhile, were down 52 per cent, while ’90s-tagged looks were up 42 per cent – the latter was also the most searched tag. With the 25th anniversary of the untimely death of Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy coming up next year, meanwhile, the Succession-fuelled “quiet luxury” trend is segueing into something that more closely resembles the understated ’90s-New-York elegance of the former Calvin Klein publicist.
What will you be wearing next year? The good news is that you probably already own most of spring’s key elements, and that clever styling – a splash of red here, a crisp white shirt there – will serve as easy updates. Ballerinas and Mary-Janes are going nowhere, nor a well-cut blazer. And carrying a full-to-bursting bowling bag stuffed with last night’s high heels, a spare pair of socks, your notebook, wallet, keys and some paracetamol, is no longer anything to be ashamed of, thanks to Miuccia Prada and Miu Miu. The designer said her show was an exploration of modern beauty: “Not beauty, but beauties, an embracing of unique characters, the joy of life.” Momentarily, it gave us something to smile about.
Short shorts
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If you can coolly observe the trend for short shorts without your mind immediately replaying that ‘1957’ song by the Royal Teens (or the Homer Simpson homage), well, you’re more culturally robust than we are. Micro shorts pumped down the catwalks in Milan – most memorably opening the new-look Gucci show, now under the direction of Sabato de Sarno – and filtered into Paris, too, at Chanel, Alexander McQueen and Isabel Marant. Think of it as the logical conclusion to autumn’s no-pants predilection.
