19 August 2024 |
Checking in with the emerging designers of Copenhagen Fashion Week spring 2025.
Scandi fashion by default has a reputation of being beige-ified in recent years. But not in Copenhagen in 2024, at least if the newest crop of emerging designers have a say. This season in the Danish capital, the big players like Ganni, Saks Potts and Stine Goya opted to do away with shows. Which meant that there was even more of a focus on newness and rising designers — many who were presenting runway shows for the very first time. Things got weird, in a good way.
On the first day of Copenhagen fashion week spring 2025, a roaring motorcycle circled the concrete pavement and a towering cage of scaffolding on the outskirts of the city. The occasion? Alectra Rothschild/Masculina’s runway show, where a cast of diverse models worked, twerked and climbed the metaphorical runway and literal cage to the tune of a live DJ. The presentation, open to anyone who wanted to attend, reflected a direct wish of the designer. “I also work at this venue, it’s a nightclub,” she says. “So when there’s a specific party called Endurance, I’m the picker in the door, and all my friends usually go to that party. The show is about the after hours beauty and the intimacy between friends when you have left the party.”
As for the clothes? They all explored the intrepid idea of intimacy, from nightgowns to skin-baring get-ups and distressed ruffled jackets, as well as other pieces titled “Tortured Rose.” Rothschild/Masculina’s show felt more akin to something you’d see in Brooklyn, but with a unique kind of twist that could only happen in Copenhagen. As that motorcycle twirled around the runway, electric Polestar cars whooshed by the edge of the venue and the sun faded in the distance over a warehouse-like building painted with the phrase “Copenhell”.
In another warehouse-like setting, Rolf Ekroth brought out a slew of flowering dresses shown on all genders, plus a pair of dandelion jeans embellished with over 250 hours worth of handmade knitted flowers. “Every season I feel I’ve been getting more and more comfortable with showing my roots,” says the designer, who founded his brand right before the pandemic. The collection was based on the historic Finnish dance concept Lavatanssit. “People gathered at these dances, drank a lot, danced and went home alone or with a couple. I wanted to start off with a bit of a more happy, Finnish look that sort of showed people getting ready for the dance, like having flowers and decorating themselves. And then came the more serious part.” Some of the models strolled down the runway with a trail of tears below one eye. “There is a very dark sense of humor that we have In Finland,” added Ekroth, of the oddly satisfying tactile creations and the related inside joke Finnish people have about how many people will end up drowning each year due to drunkenness. T-shirt dresses and crochet sweaters came pierced with little silver hoops in collaboration with the historic Finnish jewelry brand Kalevala.
Stem was another brand that challenged the norm this season. Launched in 2021 by the textile designer and weaver Sarah Brunnhuber, the 12-piece collection is zero waste and made up entirely out of natural materials. “This particular collection, which is called the Pulling Collection, is based on the pulling technique, which is a new sort of weaving and fabric manipulation that developed the past two years,” says Brunnhuber. “It’s similar to smocking in that it pulls and gathers to shape the fabric. It’s woven industrially in Italy and then I hand pull a knot to create the garments.” The result? A couple really covetable mini skirts that are textural wonderlands that speak to the tactile part of our soul. These were clothes that made you want to reach out and touch them.
In Copenhagen, the emerging designers that stand out are often the ones who are rethinking things like Sofia Ilmonen, who had a showcase inside the CPHFW NEWTALENT venue. On the racks, her clothing looked equal parts medieval and cerebral — richly hued scarlet red and deep purple gowns covered in sprays of buttons and modular panels so each one can each be transformed into new ways of wearing them. “There’s loads of references to corsets. I’ve used boning to create these great balloon shapes as well lacing to form shapes that otherwise wouldn’t be possible,” she says.
Other highlights to note? With sculpted silver metal bustiers and Mean Girls-esque boob cut-out tops at Forza Collective, there was no shortage of weirdly good silhouettes at Copenhagen fashion week this season. Rotate closed Copenhagen Fashion Week with a slew of party dresses and baby-sized bloomers, plus tops and dresses covered in cascades of Pandora jewelry reworked by the rising jewelry artist Grete Henriette who turns jewelry into dresses. In one case, she took 2,000 Pandora tennis bracelets and created a fringed dress. Henrik Vibskov, who might just be the king of Copenhagen weird for his bizarre fashion week set-ups (like a 20-foot-tall person with many hands in the past) staged a show that had multiple people dressed as mechanics controlling plastic hands that lifted mountains and valleys of white sheets for models to walk over.
Rising designer Sinéad O’Dwyer, who usually presents in London, came to Copenhagen after winning the Zalando Visionary Award and infused the runway with an inspiring amount of diversity that other global fashion weeks should take inspiration from. Size inclusivity was a major theme for many of the emerging designers in Copenhagen this season–showing that if they can do it, the bigger brands should be more than able to do it too. Blind activist Lucy Edwards walked the runway as well as a slew of models wearing denim and bold cut-out dresses paired with chunky sneakers with gummy soles from the cult Japanese brand Grounds.
But perhaps the biggest statement of emerging talent came courtesy of the student runway shows and collections of presentations from neighboring countries. The Swedish School of Textiles, the Scandinavian Academy of Fashion and Design, and the Royal Danish Academy presented runway shows or presentations, which were highlights of the week for their innovative silhouettes that shocked and surprised. At the Swedish School of Textiles show, there were blow-up inflatable outfits that elicited gasps by Sonja Sandin and balloon headpieces and outfits with kawaii sentiment by Ellen Kowka. Pia Erdt created garments that transformed from bags to skirts live on the runway. Ukraine Fashion Week and Belgium each had their own showcases with designer work from their respective countries. In the grand scheme of things, there probably isn’t any other official fashion week that’s bringing together as much new talent from as many different places (schools, different countries) as Copenhagen right now.
