By Chloe Welling
On the hottest June day on record in Paris, Anthony Vaccarello staged his Spring 2027 Menswear collection at the centre of the rotunda of the Bourse de Commerce. The museum is currently home to Fujiko Nakaya’s Cloud #07156, an installation which continuously spouts veils of mist, turning the circular space into a “landscape of fog” and periodically obscuring everything in its wake. This setting, explained Vaccarello, was integral to feeding a narrative in which restraint plays a form of seduction.
Models emerged onto the runway through dense plumes of vapour. As the fog cleared, a sexy, languid collection materialised boasting sheer shirting, leather jocks and, of course, those pellucid dress shoes.
Vaccarello set out with the intention to strip down this season–an idea which felt particularly apt given the temperature outside. The collection began with light tailoring. Blazers were reduced to their essentials, cut narrower and shorter, stripped of their lining and rendered in lightweight fabrics, the cumulative effect of which was breathability without fragility.
From there, the show dissolved into a sequence of relaxed, sherbet-toned separates and featherweight outerwear. Broad shoulders remained a constant throughout, creating a visual continuity with the strong-shouldered proposition Vaccarello has been advancing in womenswear.
Sex, as ever, was a recurring motif. Yet it came in the form of restraint that, at times, bordered on literal. Silk scarves were wrapped tightly around models’ necks, while leather underwear peeked out from beneath languid tailoring. Transparent Perspex dress shoes—a material commonly used for Pleasers—clouded with steamy perspiration. On the topic of the shoes backstage, Vaccarello posed the question: “why torture women with plastic shoes, but not men?”
Punctuating the fetishism were episodes of the familiar vulgarity of the opulent eighties from which Vaccarello continues to draw inspiration. Buttons of long-line blazers were replaced with jewel-encrusted brooches, t-shirts were tucked into a high-waisted trouser that rose nearly to the ribcage. Washed neon windbreakers and muted sorbet-coloured knits fluttered down the runway in quick succession.
The closing looks underscored the glamour. A lacquered gold trench, followed by a slim gold suit, and finally, a metallic overcoat. This ongoing dialogue between eroticism and opulence is a topic Vaccarello repeatedly makes a welcome return to.
Reduction has emerged as a defining theme across the menswear collections this season. It is not uncommon for fashion’s pendulum to swing between excess and restraint during uncertain times. Right now, it seems designers are being instinctively drawn to the latter.
As the mist finally lifted and the final look passed through the rotunda, the ideas Vaccarello has spent the past decade refining at Saint Laurent were clearer than ever. This was Saint Laurent at its most self-assured.