Mugler Spring Summer 2025
As the House of Mugler celebrates its 50th anniversary, Casey Cadwallader embarks on a tone of celebration and reflection, and a chance for his vision and that of the House codes to entwine afresh. Mugler's archive becomes fertile ground for re-interpretation. The past is not pastiched, but pruned and re-awakened - viewed with instinctive tenderness, freedom and lightness.
The flower - a fashion inspiration steeped in history, is reimagined, in the language of contemporary Mugler. The archly feminine is disrupted in Mugler and Cadwallader's shared signature: made sharp, knowing, fierce. The references to flora offer an ode to Paris, and the history of couture fashion - the lines and layers that have defined shows and ateliers for centuries, including at Mugler. And they tell a personal story too - one of Cadwallader's own recent Spring and Summer spent gardening at his country home in Fontainebleau. The meditative aspects of this work, as well as certain aesthetic elements - lithe stems, undulating petals, spiked fingers on gardening gloves - inspired the collection.
Flowers are dissected and exploded, nodding to Mugler's heritage of merging the natural world with sci-fi or technological elements. The flower is not worn, but embodied, with the architecture of the body working in tandem with layers of fabric and corsetry. We see both urban and rural gardens: in the speckles that weave across fabrics, recalling a spray of mud-licked water on a fragile petal, or in the engineered warped fishnets, which suggest criss-crossing trestles. A collaboration with Baccarat, French House of fine crystal, brings a
moment of rainfall: dazzling grape drops, intricately weaved with transparent threading, shower the body. Refreshed, petals and buds bloom vibrantly across hand-painted velvet jacquards, expertly crafted with rare shuttle looms in Lyon. Raw-edged tulle brings breezy freshness.
Refinement is key - pieces have been reworked to their most considered form. Tailoring is clean and each detail speaks of precision, from the curves of necklines - a twisted version of archive designs - to the padded petal shapes enveloping hips. Slices of flower-heads emerge, with drama and intention, from the waists of trousers - blending softness with sharpness. The geometric lines are echoed by wigs, crafted by hair artist Zhou Xue Ming, which frame the face in an alluring intervention, which re-directs focus.
This season, a new bag - The Fang - anchors looks. It blends a bat-like shape with an innovative metal fastening. Smaller versions appear on the runway, in tones and fabrics that match garments: suede with studs, cotton, denim, as well as leather.
The collection speaks of a moment of re-ignition at the House. It is an ode to inner-force, to depth of beauty, and to Mugler's unbreakable strength of character.
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