Inside the Rodin Museum, the Dior Spring/Summer 2025 RTW collection began with an arrow shooting straight onto the catwalk. Makeup artist Peter Philips says Maria Grazia Chiuri had a vision of “Amazonian” beauty, so he hired archer and artist SAGG Napoli to create one of fashion month’s most exciting moments. Napoli pulled the string back on the bow, and as the arrow fired (passing right through the mannequin!), the show began.
“A strong mind and a strong body may be the greatest thing I’ve ever done” was written on the interior walls, while the show notes read “SAGG Napoli treats fashion as a visual attribute and a tribute to her athletic figure.’ Appropriately, the backstage beauty look felt like a sequel to this summer’s golden haute couture beauty tribute to the Paris Olympics and Paralympics, this time Phillips went post-workout with a boyfriend-red runway look “like a workout blush,” he said of the “pink” post-run look, as he swiped the new Rouge Blush Colour & Glow palette (shades 100 Diorissimo, 200 Diorama and 757 Wildior) on the models’ cheeks.
“It’s about strong women,” Phillips added, noting that the models had just finished a workout or “come from a heroic battlefield” in this fantasy world. After “randomly” applying a dab of DiorShow On Stage Crayon 099 Black to a sewer line, he asked the models to close their eyes tightly (one of his signature techniques, the definition of casual, not too perfect), creating a jet black appearance. The “beautifully sweaty” skin seen in haute couture shows is back with a more subtle twist, carefully applied with Dior Capture Totale Le Serum. Just before they hit the runway, he applied additional serum to their faces as a final touch “for a more moisturizing effect.”
Just inside the brightly-lit tent-like backstage corridor, hairstylist Guido Palau contrasts the wet look, which he describes as “a very non-product experience for the hair.” Yes, it’s sporty, “with the Nineties style, where you put on a headband and tie it in a very simple way,” he says of using elastic bands to tie off the ends and leaving the ends loose, falling to the floor. The only accessory includes an elastic headband adorned with the Dior logo. “So you wrap it around and then you give it a little jerk and then the headband pulls it together, because that’s a fashion moment for me,” Palau said, explaining that the kind of look women want to wear today is “quite” high-tech while creating a high bun.
Palau credits his weaving team with creating improvisation for all the textured looks. Shamika Williams, who braids with him every season, braided six models yesterday in the spirit of a post-workout look, which she described as “a messy one, something you just want to wear, the way it comes out the back.” “It still has that same soft feel of Maria Grazia, but it’s sporty but feels a little unfinished and very doable,” says Palau. After his “big moment” in the 1990s, he now prefers “making simple looks more sophisticated with a headband.” It makes perfect sense next to the collection’s jersey fabrics, shiny tights and gladiator-style running shoes.
According to Naples, her vision of that imaginary battlefield was not promising. “For centuries, the image of a woman with a bow has been associated with the female warrior. The bow is a weapon. I didn’t want to play up to that image. Why did I want to be a warrior?” the artist’s statement says. “What if the ‘enemy’ is not someone I can or don’t want to physically defeat? (…) Rather, the enemy is a set of values and distractions that do not allow me to be my best self in the world. In today’s tee of Grazia Chiuri, on stage, Charli XCX and Billie Eilish’s single “Guess” played from the speakers, and each woman had the opportunity to define the best version of herself.
