PARIS (AP) — The birds scattered in each path as the primary drumbeat thundered throughout the plaza exterior Paris’ Pompidou Middle Tuesday, clearing the best way for a unique type of flight: Beyoncé and Jay-Z swept into the entrance row.
The star couple anchored a visitor record at Pharrell Williams’ newest Louis Vuitton spectacle that doubled as a map of latest tradition now: Bradley Cooper, J-Hope, Karol G, Pinkpanthress, Future, Pusha T, Jackson Wang, Bambam, Mason Thames, Miles Caton, D’Pharaoh Woon-A-Tai, Malcolm Washington, Jalen Ramsey, and A$AP Nast. If there was any query concerning the gravitational pull of Louis Vuitton below Williams, it evaporated earlier than the primary look hit the runway.
This was no abnormal catwalk: Williams — half showman, half pop impresario — staged a cultural passage from Paris to Mumbai, fusing Indian custom and trendy dandyism right into a punchy, sunstruck imaginative and prescient of the Vuitton man in 2026.
In Vuitton’s world, a present isn’t only a present. It’s a takeover, a temper. On Tuesday, the Pompidou’s iconic coloured pipes served as a sci-fi backdrop for a set dreamed up with Studio Mumbai architect Bijoy Jain: a life-size “Snakes and Ladders” board, alluding to each the kid’s sport and the grownup dangers of style’s international sport. For Williams, the home’s mantra of journey is much less about vacation spot, extra about movemen. Up, down, sideways, sunward.
The garments? This season, they marched to their very own drumbeat. Out got here fashions in Indian-style chunky sandals, striped boxy shorts and blue preppy shirts with sleeves billowing like monsoon sails. Silken cargo pants shimmered within the solar; pin-striped puffers added a louche, nearly Bollywood-kitsch edge. Cricket jerseys appeared with jeweled collars or — why not? — a puffy hood dripping with rhinestones. Blue pearlescent leather-based bombers flirted with the bling of Mumbai’s movie units, whereas pin-striped tailoring riffed on each the British Raj and Parisian boulevardiers.
If all this felt like cultural collision, that’s by design. Williams’ Vuitton has change into a temper board for international wanderlust: the checked silks, the mismatched stripes, the trompe l’oeil materials that look sun-faded by precise adventures. It’s a nod to the itinerant dandyism that’s quick changing into his Vuitton calling card. Much less about nostalgia, extra about now.
However don’t mistake the globe-trotting optimism for naivety. There’s calculation within the chaos. Williams’ references bounce from Kenzo ’s Nigo (his onetime collaborator) to Indian up to date artisans — just like the hand-beaded snakes slithering throughout shirts, or the sandalwood-scented linens that recall a summer season in Rajasthan. The “worldwide community” Vuitton preaches is actual, nevertheless it’s additionally realpolitik: What could possibly be extra luxurious in 2025 than clothes that tries to please everybody and all over the place, with out shedding itself?
In fact, with Vuitton, the equipment make the person and this season’s baggage, bejeweled sandals and hardware-heavy necklaces delivered the requisite Instagram bait, every a covetable passport stamp in leather-based or gold. It’s maximalism, certain, however not only for the TikTok set: the craftsmanship, from sun-bleached fabric to hand-loomed stripes, rewards anybody who bothers to look twice.
If there’s a criticism, it’s that generally the noise of references threatens to drown out the sign. Williams piles motif on motif, coloration on coloration, pleasure on pleasure, till coherence blurs into sheer, Dionysian vitality. However possibly that’s the purpose: In a season of worldwide anxiousness the Vuitton man chooses to strut, sparkle, and swerve.
LVMH, the world’s largest luxurious group, posted report income of 84.7 billion euros in 2024, with its Vogue & Leather-based Items division anchored by Louis Vuitton nonetheless main the pack. With a market worth close to $455 billion and over 6,300 shops worldwide, Vuitton stays the world’s most useful luxurious model. Even with a latest dip in gross sales, its scale and affect are unmatched.
Because the final look circled the Pompidou and the birds resettled, Vuitton’s odyssey felt much less like a style present and extra like an announcement: the world is a sport board, the ladders are actual, and Louis Vuitton remains to be rolling the cube.
