The Luxury of Space
Review of Balmain Fall 2025 Fashion Show
By Mark Wittmer
THE COLLECTION
THE VIBE
Enveloping volume. Draped softness. Textural Tension.
Balmain closed out the third day of Paris Fashion Week’s Fall 2025 season with a celebration of the luxury of space. Creative director Olivier Rousteing and his design team swapped structural tailoring and glossy glamor for enveloping knitwear, exploratory draping, and cocooning silhouettes.
Embodying the spirit of voluminous ease, expansive knits – from quietly elegant takes on everyday sweaters to wool jersey dresses and fluidly draped mohair forms – formed the collection’s anchor. Tailoring was similarly softened and oversized, with coats with enormous lapels being a particularly fun and emblematic take on the season’s theme of pushing the luxury of being cocooned in a personal bubble of softness.
Nonetheless, this softness was countered by an animalistic energy courtesy of zebra prints and a stunningly crafted crocodile embossing texture, as well as the statement hardware, which reminded us this was after all a Balmain collection: oversized buckle closures, talon earrings, chunky bracelets. Shoes were a particular standout, with supple leather or playfully fuzzy boots and sculpturally twisted pumps emerging as star pieces. While largely anchored by black, off-white, and gray, the color palette rhythmically blossomed into brilliant moments of bright color, sometimes in unexpected yet successful combinations.
THE DIRECTION
THE WRAP UP
While it’s exciting to see Balmain explore some different directions and emphasize draping and fluid knitwear, it also meant that this was one of the few collections from Rousteing that didn’t feel incredibly Balmain. His collections have gone in many different directions, but they have been united by the common factor that with almost all of the looks you can look at them and instantly recognize that DNA.
But that spirit was still present in the accessories and shoes, which we can expect to shape up to be the collection’s star sellers. At a time when many brands are playing it safe, it’s also exciting to see Balmain and Rousteing experiment with new textures and forms and, ultimately craft another new vision of what Balmain can be.
