Having already made her Givenchy women-centric, Sarah Burton opened the aperture even wider with her sensational fall show, letting loose with menswear fabrics, velvet, animal prints, kimono silks, lace, silver bullion and wild furry textures — orchestrating it all with a sure hand.
She set up her dark fall runway venue like a giant zoetrope, which added a cinematic mood, and the winding runway path obscured each model until she came quite near, making each new exit a surprise, and allowing you to focus on each character.
Eva Herzigová nearly bowled you over with her confident stride, a mannish topcoat propped on her shoulders and a killer tuxedo underneath.
“It’s very personal,” Burton said of the collection during a preview. “In many ways, it’s about how you put yourself back together in a world that’s falling apart.”
She offered a multitude of compelling suggestions, from immaculate tailoring through to the breathtaking painted, embroidered, shredded and fringed gown worn by Mona Tougaard, which resembled a Flemish flower painting come to hot-blooded life.
Indeed, several of the models resembled characters in Old Master paintings from northern European countries, a feeling heightened by the head wraps Stephen Jones fashioned from a T-shirt twisted in a way that might make Johannes Vermeer pick up his oils.
“It’s really how to address all those elements of being a woman, and how to navigate that,” Burton said, echoing a sentiment expressed in Milan by Miuccia Prada, who used layering to get a woman through the day. “How do you speak to all those different emotions and different experiences?”
Burton offered the comfort and luxury of a blue shearling coat, as loose and cozy as a dressing gown to cinch at the waist; the immaculate chic of black Spencer jackets with pinched waists and peplums; the slithery seduction of a knit top spilling pompoms, or a dead-simple leather skirt or velvet slipdress slashed open on an angle; and the grandeur of a heavy green satin cape propped on the shoulder of Alex Cosani.
The designer brought personal talismans and treasures into the mix: a decaying old kimono she bought when she first arrived in Paris in 2024, and a yellow jacquard she excavated from one of the Givenchy collections by Lee Alexander McQueen, with whom she spent most of her career, succeeding him after his death in 2010.
Burton also reprised many of the great ideas from her first two collections, including the jeweled top that went viral when Jenna Ortega wore it to the 2025 Emmy Awards. “We had orders for it,” Burton said, noting her latest version also has a buyer in waiting.