Arriving to a Louis Vuitton show at Nicolas Ghesquière’s regular Paris Fashion Week venue, the Cour Carrée du Louvre, there’s often a distinct sense of time travel. By the time you’ve made it past the hordes of screaming K-pop fans, hung a right past the I.M. Pei-designed glass pyramid, and entered the palace-turned-museum’s main courtyard, you aren’t quite sure what season you’re in—or even what century. And for the spring 2025 show on Tuesday evening, Ghesquière placed a large reflective tent in the Cour Carrée that created a hall-of-mirrors effect, stretching the surrounding French Renaissance columns, pilasters, and ornate sculptures ad infinitum.
The transtemporal experience continued inside the mirrored space, where Ghesquière had fashioned a colorful mosaic runway out of LV monograms. The house lights went down, last summer’s Jamie XX and Robyn banger “Life” played over the speakers, and the runway started to levitate, creating an elevated catwalk like those of the 1990s, which revealed itself to be a collection of vintage trunks that could have been made around the time of the maison’s founding in the mid 19th century.
That bit of stagecraft set the scene for a collection that showed Ghesquière in fine form, bricolaging his usual Orlando-like references such as Louis XIV frock coats, sci-fi shoulders, and 1980s skater skirts with new elements. The first six looks brought a lightness and sporty verve to Ghesquière’s beloved 17th-century-meets-22nd-century tailoring, pairing nipped-waist, boulder-shoulder outerwear with sleek bike shorts, jumpsuits, or leotards. Sturdy sandals with squared-off toes that looked a bit like pointe shoes completed the choose-your-own-adventure vibe.
The final five looks, including a Cheongsam top and generously proportioned Petite Malle bag, featured a collaboration with Laurent Grasso, showcasing pictorial works from the French artist’s Studies into the past; the series transposes anachronous elements like UFOs and celestial phenomena into what otherwise appear to be Italian and Flemish Renaissance paintings. In between there was lots more to love, including 1920 lariat necklaces featuring the LV trefoil, bags shaped like Victorian fans, and sparkling cabochons that danced across babydoll dresses, structured outerwear, and cloche hats.
