Why history is a big inspiration for Cruise fashion shows

To host their Cruise 2025 fashion shows, international luxury brands chose a variety of beautiful historical locations—from a Unesco World Heritage Site to cities with architectural marvels that have a strong connection with brands’ founders.

The idea behind the venue selection was the same: to offer the well-heeled HNI (high net individual) client an immersive experience into the brand’s universe.

Gucci’s creative head, Sabato De Sarno, for instance, presented his Cruise 2025 showcase at the Tate Museum in London—a city strongly linked to its founder, Guccio Gucci, who found inspiration to kick-start his leather goods business while working as a porter and lift attendant at the famous Savoy hotel.

“Tate Modern is the perfect cross-section to narrate the city’s essence, with its great Turbine Hall that welcomes and gathers everyone, and with the Tanks, generators of ideas,” said Sabato in the press notes.

The city informed the collection as well. It featured 1970s-inspired pleated slip dresses, geek chic tailoring punctuated with pussybow collars, besides a swirl of chamomile bloom appliqués.

Celebrating Marseille

After Manchester and Senegal, Chanel decided to take its show this year to the south of France. The brand presented its collection on the roof of the Cité Radieuse in Marseille. Listed as a Unesco World Heritage Site, the building was built between 1947 and 1952 by Charles-Édouard Jeanneret, popularly known as Le Corbusier, as a space to encourage arts and culture.

“The sun, architecture, music and dance: Marseille also has a very strong sense of freedom. I was inspired by the codes of lifestyle, of everyday life and by all the things that invite movement. The sea and the wind made me want to play with wetsuits,” explained Chanel’s creative director Virginie Viard in the press notes.

The fondness for Marseille showed in the clothes too. The Chanel bags, for instance, were informed by the building’s materiality, created in colours like wet concrete grey. Tweed suits, scuba ballet flats, hoodies, beach-appropriate bride dresses with camellia appliqués and boater hats had nautical touches, embodying the outdoorsy spirit of Marseille.

A Barcelona vibe

Late May, Nicolas Ghesquière presented the Louis Vuitton Cruise 25 collection inside Barcelona’s Hypostyle Room of Park Guell, or “Room of a Hundred Columns”, by Antoni Gaudí.

Completed in 1914, it is now a public garden listed as a Unesco World Heritage site. Louis Vuitton offered ensembles in neutral hues, accessorised with gaucho hats as a nod to Barcelona. In his press interviews, Ghesquière also said the collection was inspired by the works of painters like Diego Velázquez and Francisco de Zurbarán.

Manish Mishra is a Delhi-based writer and content creator.

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