Valentino Explores Intimacy for Fall/Winter 2025

Alessandro Michele orchestrated a Fall/Winter 2025 show where the intimate became a spectacle, blurring the boundaries between interiority and staging. Inspired by the idea of a "meta-theater of intimacies," as show notes say, the creative director of Valentino imagined a space where identity is constructed not in the quest for an authentic self, but in the infinite play of appearances and revelations. Through superimposed silhouettes, deceptive transparencies, and materials that oscillate between protection and exposure, Michele evokes an intimacy that is never fixed, always changing in the new collection.

The runway show's decor, evoking sublimated public toilets, became a heterotopia (meaning, worlds within worlds) where the intimate and the collective intertwined, where the ritual of care was transformed into an identity performance. Muted hues, crumpled velvets, and metallic flashes in the collection convey a tension between introspection and representation. Sheer dresses and other semi-naked looks tugged at this theme as well. The catwalk's Lynchian atmosphere gave the show an aura that was both troubling and subversive. More than a simple runway show at Paris Fashion Week, the artistic director composes a manifesto: Intimacy is not a preserved sanctuary, but a moving stage, a place of appearance where the "I" constantly reinvents itself.

Against a red backdrop, models emerged from the walls lined with bathroom stalls, revealing Michele's designs for the Fall/Winter 2025 collection. Chappell Roan, Jared Leto, Barry Keoghan, Parker Posey, and Sophie Thatcher were among some of the stars in attendance sitting in the front row, anticipating Michele's designs and what they can expect from Valentino in the years to come. Like his philosophically tinged Gucci collections, the Italian designer is bringing that pensive vision to Valentino.

See additional standout looks from the runway below.