Marc Jacobs Spring 2025 Ready-to-Wear: A Surreal Dream in Hyperbole

Marc Jacobs doesn’t whisper. He declares. And for Spring 2025, he did so in a vocabulary of excess, a symphony of exaggerated proportions and surrealist details that felt both referential and forward-looking. The collection was a play on extreme hyperbole—sweaters sculpted into near-cartoonish silhouettes, pants punctuated with oddly placed darts, and skirts that either clung flat like paper dolls or billowed into rock-like formations.

This season, Jacobs continued his recent tradition of skipping post-show commentary, opting instead for a poetic prelude in his show notes. He opened with the word courage and closed with an earnest reflection:

"With precious freedom we dream and imagine without limitation… not to escape from reality but to help navigate, understand, and confront it, exploring through curiosity, conviction, compassion, and love."

Jacobs is no stranger to extremes, and this season, he pushed them further. His signature voluminous silhouettes took on new life, with pillowy trapeze dresses and hyper-accentuated hourglass shapes. There were nods to his own past—Jacobs' archives are rich with grand statements—but also to Comme des Garçons' iconic paper-doll collection, a wink at surrealist fashion history.

Then there were the shoes—if one could even call them that. Boots curled at the tips like something out of a storybook, evening heels extended into near-impossible proportions. It was footwear that defied practicality but demanded attention. This is where Jacobs thrives: in the space between fantasy and wearability, between nostalgia and the avant-garde.

What makes Jacobs a force isn’t just his ability to design loudly, but his ability to convince us of the magic within the madness. This season, he conjured a host of muses—Betty Boop, the Queen of Hearts, perhaps even Marie Antoinette—but left it open-ended enough for each viewer to see something different. The soundtrack, Philip Glass’s Einstein on the Beach, underscored this dreamlike quality. Its hypnotic, looping sequences have become a recurring motif in Jacobs' world, reinforcing the idea that his collections are not just fashion shows, but meditative experiences.

Then, there were the sequined dots, covering the models’ lips—another cryptic message in Jacobs’ visual lexicon. Were they a whisper of rebellion? A reference to the fragile state of the world? Or simply another piece of the designer’s grand dreamscape?

Whatever the interpretation, one thing remains certain: Marc Jacobs is not here to conform. He is here to imagine, to amplify, to push. And in a world that often seeks to dilute boldness, that kind of audacity is nothing short of essential.