Paris Fashion Week looks to the next generation with Marie Adam-Leenaerdt, Mame Kurogouchi and Germanier

On Tuesday, Paris Fashion Week was not all about Dior. The second day of womenswear shows for spring/summer 2025 focused on the collections of a number of emerging brands. In recent seasons, these events have become a must-see for media and buyers. Among the must-see shows on Tuesday were those featuring the creative looks of Belgian designer Marie Adam-Leenaerdt, the delicate collection of Japanese stylist Mame Kurogouchi and the exuberant creations of Swiss designer Kevin Germanier.

Marie Adam-Leenaerdt chose the Terminus Nord for her show, just opposite Paris' Gare du Nord train station. The legendary Art Deco brasserie, dating back to the 1920s, was reserved exclusively for guests of the show and served egg salad and pâté en croûte, ideal dishes for when it was almost lunchtime.

Adam-Leenaerdt could not have chosen a better setting to celebrate her everyday fashion, spiced with a dash of humour. The Belgian designer's latest collection included variations on the skirt theme, and this time she worked on T-shirts. However, the collection was anything but sporty and casual. The models who entered the brasserie with determination, dressed in elegant dresses and suits, with their arms and hands sheathed in long, fine gloves, had a femme fatale, almost mysterious attitude.

At Marie Adam-Leenaerdt, nothing is ordinary. As she explains in the presentation note she places on tables like a menu, her idea was to work on the T-shirt to “deconstruct and reimagine its familiar codes.” Adam-Leenaerdt has transformed this wardrobe staple in many ways, for example, into an elegant white blouse worn over a straight, mid-length skirt with a hint of pleat. Elsewhere, she adapted a calf-length cotton T-shirt dress by enlarging the sleeves and tying a strip of the same fabric at thigh height to create draped volume.

Other T-shirts were transformed into stiff, oversized armour or worn over tight miniskirts in lace or stretch fabric. Following the same theme, Adam-Leenaerdt transformed T-shirts into a collarless, hourglass-shaped jacket or coat in vibrant yellow or red, and even into lurex corset tops. The same treatment was reserved for sweatshirts. Among others, one was transformed into a soft trench coat in grey fleece.

Adam-Leenaerdt graduated in 2020 from the École de La Cambre and worked for six months at Balenciaga before returning to Brussels to create his own label in 2022. His collections are now available in some 15 multi-brand retailers worldwide, including Stijl in Brussels, Net-a-porter, Ssense, Matches Fashion and Bergdorf Goodman.

Mame Kurogouchi has also chosen a restaurant to present her new collection, inviting her guests once again to Ogata, the Parisian temple of Japanese cuisine. For next summer, designer Maiko Kurogouchi has opted for shapes, redesigning the silhouette by introducing unexpected curves, as if it had been created with brushstrokes.

His starting point was typical Japanese objects, such as a teapot or a lantern. He then looked for similar shapes in everyday life, photographing various objects with a Polaroid. He chose a glass, a stone, a pot, a pregnant woman's belly and other objects. He then coloured them black to visualise their contours and shapes, which he then transferred to the clothes in the collection.

For example, the asymmetrical neckline of a tank top was tilted to form an unusual oval. A crescent-shaped slit on one shoulder was created by placing one blouse diagonally over another. Short satin dresses decorated with micro-embroidery were shortened at the front. The hood of a sweatshirt left only the oval of the face visible.

Kurogouchi abandoned straight lines in favor of sinuous, curved lines to define the hems of jackets, skirts, dresses and shirts. Here and there, he tucked garments in to break up overly boxy lines, for example on some long tunics. His elongated silhouettes and delicately balanced ensembles exuded sophisticated elegance. The shoes, mostly Japanese-style sandals and flip-flops with leather laces, were especially original.

After the sobriety, it was time for the excesses. At Germanier, it was Rio Carnival and Christmas all at once! The brand, known for its commitment to sustainability (it only uses recycled materials for its clothes), brought sparkling energy and a festive, joyful atmosphere to the catwalk, with a cascade of brightly coloured garlands presenting fairy-tale, often grandiose looks.

The brand’s founder, Swiss designer Kevin Germanier, has been hired by Galeries Lafayette to create the Parisian department store’s Christmas displays this season. Germanier loves rummaging through vintage shops and using scraps of fabric and unsold stock to create his looks, but he has now discovered a new source of supply: outdated window displays, especially those of luxury boutiques, which would otherwise end up in the trash. “It opened up a whole new perspective for me. I discovered piles of ribbons and curtains with shiny tassels that were destined for the scrap heap. We’re actually in the middle of a big bin here,” he joked backstage as he presented his collection. A large portion of the outfits were made from plastic strips and shiny, colourful tassels, which are mainly used for tinsel and Christmas decorations.

A treasure for Germanier, who drew inspiration from astrology, the zodiac and the planets to create her collection. She used gold tinsel to create a luminous sunlit dress and silver strips to create ensembles inspired by Mercury and the Moon. She also used the curled ribbons from gift packages and the busts of shop window mannequins, split in half and turned into corsets, onto which she fixed piles of thin coloured strips that cascaded to the floor.

Other models were made from fishnet jumpsuits covered in iridescent sequins in the shape of scales or in other shades according to a carefully studied colour combination. These fishnet dresses were crocheted by inmates in the prisons of Rio and Sao Paulo, in collaboration with Brazilian designer and craftsman Gustavo Silvestre, who has been working with Germanier since the brand was founded. The Brazilian spirit was evident throughout the collection, for example in the dress made from multicoloured Havaianas flip-flops.