Prada Fall/Winter 2025 Menswear Review
Angelo Badalamenti’s “The Pink Room” from Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me played during Prada’s Fall/Winter 2025 Menswear show today. David Lynch, the legendary American filmmaker and director of Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me, died four days before the show. Lynch’s film work and Prada’s designs have something intrinsically in common. Both have been described as impenetrable. Individual audience members either understand it or they don’t. With both Lynch and Prada, creativity comes from the subconscious and shouldn’t be explained by the creator. It’s a gut feeling and people must come to their own conclusions. But is every interpretation correct?
That sense of mystery and the audience-as-detective is vital for understanding Prada. Co-creative directors Miuccia Prada and Raf Simons drop hints in interviews with the fashion press, but few other designers are ahead of the zeitgeist like they are. Prada and Simons understand the need for both the light and the dark. Like in Twin Peaks, bitter black coffee needs to be paired with the sweetness of cherry pie. That’s the fullness of life.
Prada’s Fall/Winter 2025 Menswear offering explored this balance. Sinister-looking slashed animal pelts draped over precision-cut tailored jackets. The gaunt models sauntered in upturned and severely pointed cowboy boots. The boots were often in an adorable floral print, almost chintzy, as was a few knit tops and fur hats. What we have here is a dichotomy: intimidating tailored suits and winter jackets with cutesy details, light and dark.
Rigid scaffolding covered the tri-level runway, the forest of metal pipes creating a cold sense of isolation. The show’s invitation itself was a small chunk of this scaffolding, precision cut into small, handheld pieces for the audience to keep. These pipes pierced the sky-blue floral carpet on the ground; an almost William Morris prettiness contrasted against the walls of cold metal bars. Order and chaos. Within this setting the models walked along, carrying massive leather weekender bags in burnished colors of brown, black, and grey. Some of them had their hands in their pockets, bare chests exposed under layers and layers of unbuttoned coats, jackets, and shirts.
Little anchor charms and sailor-suit toggle buttons decorated this collection. There was a subtle element of Jack the Ripper throughout. Victorian silver chains bounced along knit jumpers and leather pants. In contrast, bright Americana influences popped up as well, definitely a Simons touch. Specifically, the white boots and tapered light blue satin pants call back to Simons’ Calvin Klein days. There was cowboy fringe, star-spangled jumpers, classic denim, and parkas on display as well. Distinctly American. Elements Simons also explored at Calvin Klein for Fall 2018. There were even a few mini-basketball earrings. Upon retrospect, the fur pelts draped on coats often resembled a Texan cowhide rug.
Michael Nyman’s “Memorial” closed the show with its sweeping and romantic strings. In the lineup, one look stood out amongst the muted color palette. A daffodil yellow tartan coat, light as feather, over a celluloid-thin pastel pink and blue tartan shirt. The flood of models in their furs and heavy leathers shuffled along in a straight line before Miuccia Prada and Raf Simons took their bow. From the bird’s-eye-view, that little daffodil coat stood out the most. Even though the light seemed small, it still triumphed over the dark as the swell of violins filled the atmosphere. Very Lynchian.
Photos Courtesy of Vogue