July 10, 2025 |
At Viktor & Rolf’s autumn/winter 2025 couture show, the silhouette did more than define the garment – it called it into question. Titled Angry Birds, the collection unfolded not as a linear presentation but as a mirrored proposition: fifteen identical black looks, each shown twice. First, in full plumage – ballooned with candy-coloured feathers, sculptural flourishes and millinery by Stephen Jones that bordered on avian couture caricature. Then again, featherless, stripped back and bare-boned – the same outfits, but with the noise turned down.
The mating call of synchroneity and visual doubling recalled the design duo’s 1998 couture debut, where Viktor Horsting and Rolf Snoeren played a similar game, presenting high-drama, haute looks alongside stripped-down counterparts. Back then, it was about translating art into fashion. Now, it reads more like a tightly edited commentary on performance and persona.
The feathers – long a fixture of haute couture as symbols of fantasy and feminine display – became something else entirely here: infrastructure. They built the garment but also obscured it. Their removal deflated the robust silhouette so much so it seemed to deflate the myth that couture equals adornment. What remained was simpler, monochrome and in many ways, more unsettling.
There were, of course, couture signatures: razor-sharp tailoring, engineered bows, wired tulle and exaggerated shoulders. Eveningwear welcomed asymmetry and fragility: think pastels in pale peach and grey, shawled collars, cloqué veiled overlays and custom Christian Louboutin satin heels.
Whether Angry Birds was a meditation on identity, ego or the increasingly performative nature of fashion itself is beside the point. Viktor & Rolf’s work has always existed in the liminal space between seriousness and spectacle. This time, it offered both and asked which version we favour.
Photography courtesy of Victor & Rolf.
