Kim Shui's Debut Menswear Goes for Gold
On Saturday evening, the downtown NYC designer, known for her cultish corsets and girly eveningwear, excitingly entered the men’s domain at her Spring 2025 show. Jordan Chiles made a grand-finale appearance, too.
Kim Shui? Menswear? No wonder Hypebeast had a fantastic front-row seat at the downtown New York designer’s Spring 2025 runway on Saturday evening, where she quietly let loose her first-ever designs for the category with such nonchalance.
Inside one of Hudson Yards’ contemporary lobbies, models royally descended a grand staircase to meet Manhattan’s glitterati on the ground floor. For context, Shui said the spectacle was inspired by Matthey Barney’s SECONDARY exhibition, a five-channel video installation and terracotta sculpture gallery rooted in the ancient Japanese art form Kintsugi (or the process of repairing broken pottery), which she saw for herself in Paris at the Fondation Cartier this summer. So, the designs that cascaded from the second floor were each fragmented, reconstructed and polished again with complexity.
Sheer black dresses transformed into sculptures of their own, with white metal floral decals cautiously concealing the torso, while patent leather corsets and firm skirts boasted intricate gold patterns, referential of the designer’s now-expansive archive. Menswear, too, employed loose-fitting corsetry that was tied across the body with slim leather strings, a design tactic that was also used down the leg on masculine leather trousers with a soft, reptilian-like finish.
Model Jake Fleming sported an adjacent style that swapped leather strings for silver, “K”-branded zippers darting from the waist to the ankle. His top, a form-fitting, brown-yellow corset done with regal drapery across the shoulders, was ideal for the androgynous client Shui seems to be targeting. Later, a deep-neck sequin tank top, paired with revealing pink trousers knotted liberally with dainty bows, left ample room at the chest for an eye-gluing silver flower necklace to lock the gaze of all iPhones. Men’s robes, too, were painted with purple blossoms.
Illustrative lilac bouquets became the core motif on the line’s final round of Shui’s beloved corsets, girly skirts and sell-out eveningwear. US Olympic gymnast Jordan Chiles closed the show in a blooming bodysuit ornamented with a fluttering cape. Leading Shui’s Spring 2025 entourage for the final carousel, Team USA’s sweetheart became a walking epitome of Kim Shui’s voguish objective: go for gold.
See Kim Shui’s Spring 2025 runway in the gallery above, and head backstage at the show with photographer Sarah Schecker below.
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