The sometimes eerie, mostly arresting, collection serves as a glimpse of the house’s innovative future in Glenn Martens’ hands.
Bold. Haunting. Beautiful. Maison Margiela Artisanal’s Fall 2025 collection is Glenn Martens’ dark, romantic tribute to the fashion house’s past and a daring outlook for its future. Above all, it’s a spectacle of art and creative innovation, marking the designer’s debut as the label’s new creative director.
Known for his avant-garde designs and experimentation with craft, Martens’ show on Wednesday night was at times eerie but mostly arresting. He took the audience to the Le Cent Quatre—a vibrant cultural center in Paris that was originally a funeral parlor—and decorated it with artistic chaos.
The walls were a mishmash of crumpled and creased posters, while the floor was a papier-mâché of checkerboard patterns. Guests, meanwhile, sat in mismatched wooden chairs in different rooms. Martens cryptically described the look as a fusion of “six different palatial interiors” that altogether suggests the faded grandeur of a stately home.
Related story: Kim Jones bids Dior adieu as Maison Margiela welcomes Glenn Martens
Related story: Maison Margiela’s first Manila store brings a whiff of fresh fragrance
Martens’ debut collection at Maison Margiela looked as if it was soiled, crackled, and unearthed deep from the archives—particularly that of the French fashion house. The coed couture used offbeat materials, such as lining fabrics and vintage leather jackets.
Discarded costume jewelry was looped together to create a shift dress, trench coats were fashioned from transparent plastics, while oil paint was applied to men’s jeans. Martens said that much of these materials were sourced from Guérissol, a chain of thrift stores in Paris.
Related story: Science and style come together in Iris van Herpen’s hypnotic Paris show
Related story: Couture gets a futuristic twist at Schiaparelli’s Fall 2025/26 show
For his debut couture collection, the Bruges-born designer drew inspiration from the medieval architecture and atmosphere of West Flanders and the Netherlands. Rich layers of fabric manipulation abound in the capsule. There are enormous gowns with ripples of metallic organza and others that are dramatically pinched at the waist. Some were painted to resemble stone. “Statuesque forms evoke the saintly figures of church façades,” the show notes read.
One dress in duchess satin resembles the ghostly statue on the cover of Dead Can Dance’s 1987 album, “Within the Realm of a Dying Sun.” Martens continued his otherworldly narrative with gowns printed with flowers referencing 17th-century still-life paintings and 3D bird wings overlaying an illusion tulle.
Besides the opulent gowns, what ultimately makes Maison Margiela Artisanal’s Fall 2025 collection distinct is its use of masks, which was one of founder Martin Margiela’s most enduring motifs. According to Wallpaper magazine, Margiela’s mask first appeared in the famed designer’s S/S 1989 debut collection and later became a symbol of his desire to remain anonymous.
Martens embraced Margiela’s iconic mask with the brand’s latest collection and reinvented it with discarded boxes, battered metal, shattered crystals, sheer organza, and appliqué lace. The result was a range of carefully crafted pieces that added to the spectacle of the striking collection.
Related story: Armani Privé illuminates in the grandeur of black
Related story: For Fall 2025/26, Chanel Couture revisits its roots as it prepares for a new chapter
Martens follows two of fashion’s most influential designers—Martin Margiela, who co-founded his namesake brand with Jenny Mairens in 1988, and John Galliano, who served as its creative director for the last 10 years. Like these two celebrated artists, Martens’ task is to “reclaim the house’s DNA with elegance.” Evidently, his debut show is nothing short of an impactful start.
