Balmain SS25 Lets Art Imitate Humanity
Designer Olivier Rousteing referenced Monsieur Balmain’s breakthrough “New French Style,” as well as the unique pillars of his coined uniform.
Olivier Rousteing is a true artist. For Spring 2025, the prolific designer’s Balmain became a canvas for grand expression: realistic faces, nails and lips took over the label’s architectural silhouettes via intricate embroidery, while rounded heads—reminiscent of the sandy creation the creative director wore while accompanying Tyla to this year’s Met Gala—formed skirts and dresses alike. Across the collection, Rousteing flexed his maestro, so much so that Cardi B was smiling cheek-to-cheek in the front row.
“We’ve kept this collection extremely focused, with the goal of ensuring that every design is immediately recognizable as containing key strands of the DNA of today’s modern Balmain,” Rousteing wrote in his collection notes. He did so by relying on the House’s artisans, who only continue to master the art of powerful shoulders, angular waists and glittering embellishments in the contemporary. His mood board was covered in Monsieur Balmain’s breakthrough “New French Style,” and, more specifically, his historical “Jolie Madame” silhouette.
In practice, Rousteing’s picturesque portrait pieces required hundreds of thousands of beads, which were embroidered onto his structured silhouettes over the course of several weeks. The results echoed Pierre Balmain’s ornamentalism from the 1940s and ‘50s, while much of the line’s styling was more akin to Rousteing’s everyday look — a satisfying blend of old and new.
“The often-repeated combo of skinny leather pants and a DB jacket thrown over a simple tee or tank has been my go-to look for closing runways and meeting with the press for over a decade—and now it’s been adapted to form part of this season’s extensive daywear offerings,” he wrote. Not only does Rousteing want you to revel in his Balmain artisanship, but he wants you to look like him while doing so, too. At his House, art imitates life — both that of the Balmain woman and himself.
Following the final carousel, Balmain’s show closed with a model brigade wearing simple silk sheats in a variety of neutral hues. Rousteing called those last looks his favorite interpretation of the label’s icon: “the inspiring diversity of beauty that is constantly celebrated inside our inclusive Balmain Army.”
See Balmain’s Spring/Summer 2025 collection in the gallery above, and stay tuned to Hypebeast for more Paris Fashion Week coverage.
