Prada SS25 Breaks the Status Quo
Miuccia Prada and Raf Simons designed a collection that left all the algorithmic niches satisfied — aliens, cowgirls, daredevils, scholars and archivists included.
Miuccia Prada and Raf Simons have some of the most influential hands in fashion today: the former designer’s Miu Miu label has entirely defied the looming luxury slowdown with sales almost doubling in the first half of this year, and the duo’s joint effort at Prada (also posting impressively positive numbers) is a hit-factory that cleverly envisions fashion’s future with thought-provoking commentary on the state of now.
Where Prada’s Spring 2025 menswear collection asked viewers to question their perception of the current material world, the label’s womenswear line for the season, presented in Milan on Thursday, blended a melting pot of all the trends, moods and blueprints that define it.
Here, Prada and Simons rewrote the “rules” for what can and cannot go together. Western staples, like suede chore coats, clashed with intergalactic chrome skirts and kinky BDSM-inspired harnesses, while unnerving black feathers, bug-eyed glasses and chain-linked decals brought the collection’s likeable weirdness to the forefront.
The designers crossed the spectrum of conservative and provocative: classic foral prints decorated dainty, round-collared tops, while metallic dresses were hole-punched to leave much of the human form on display. In outerwear, shiny black leather mingled with pastel-pink nylon; and the breadth of eveningwear could outfit the likes of posh businesswomen, otherworldly Martians and ballet dancers at once.
Footwear was just as eclectic: Prada and Simons revived myraid styles from the legacy label’s archives to much fanfare, and rarely were two models wearing the same one.
The collection’s lack of cohesion was exactly the commentary that the two brainy fashion designers were trying to make. Today’s internet-driven culture moves lightning fast; it’s compartmentalized into endless niches, sub-niches and cores for the viewer to digest and identify with; so many of them exist, in fact, that there is even one for Mrs. Prada herself (#miucciacore). While the zeitgeist’s spotlight is spliced among these algorithmic subsets, Prada’s future-minded eye is glued to as many of them as possible.
See Prada’s Spring/Summer 2025 collection in the gallery above, and stay tuned to Hypebeast for more Milan Fashion Week coverage.
