Paris is burning up with Olympic fever. And even the prestigious couture week (brought forward this year to accommodate the Olympic games beginning 26 July), isn’t immune to the hype the world’s largest sporting event brings.
Amongst those who are embracing the arrival of the Olympics flame - rather than fighting it like many of Paris’ residents, who are fleeing the jam-packed capital for the duration of the games - is Maria Grazia Chiuri, who, for her autumn/winter 2024-2025 show, harnessed the power of the fashion-meets-sports intersection, presenting an haute couture collection that was - amongst many other things - inspired by the upcoming games, and how sportswear has influenced the biggest leaps in womenswear throughout history. ‘When I think about sport, I don’t think about it in a traditional way. For me, sport is about the body, the clothes and how the dress can perform,’ the designers said backstage ahead of the show. ‘If you look at the evolution of the wardrobe in sport, you see that being able to perform is an important element, but this happens in dialogue with the material, the cut and the shape of things,' she continues.
And fabric played a seminal role in her convention-breaking approach to the art of couture this season, introducing an unusual fabric to the catwalk: jersey. Here, the casual material gets a couture makeover, of course, by way of metal mesh and embroidered iterations. Elsewhere, pleats accentuated movement in floor-length dresses and signature draping riffed on classical sculptures, while one-shouldered goddess gowns revealed another real life staple with a couture twist, the humble tank top.
Chiuri’s message on the politics of the female body was underlined by the design of the showspace, which was flanked by artworks from the late feminist artist, Faith Ringgold, whose work centres around notions of the African American identity and gender inequality. Couture or ready-to-wear, sports or the arts, Chiuri’s stance remains powerful: female empowerment takes precedence.