This season, fashion has been feeling a little messy, embracing the chaos and lack of decorum that so often defines youth. Prada leant into skimpy bras, nu-rave neons, and mismatched styling. Glenn Martens’s swansong show for Diesel was headlined by snogging actors recreating one-night stands in the risers and a collection of shredded looks. Even Burberry took a tarnished approach to its fabrications while calling on a swaggering Central Cee to walk the runway in sagged baggy jeans — hoodie up. So much for the luxury polish.
How does this turn to the imperfections of youth style and subcultures square with luxury price hikes and reduced luxury spending among Gen Z shoppers? Indeed, consumer sentiment is shaky. Late last year, in a Vogue Business study, several Gen Zs shared that they consider spending large amounts of money on luxury distasteful and don’t deem new luxury goods as worth the cost. Instead, the thrill of securing an IYKYK find from a vintage marketplace provides their closet with more cultural capital than a pricey brand-new purchase. For The New York Times, Marni’s latest collection was exemplary of this price-audience dissonance, proposing “Gen Z chaos” despite the couture cost.
More broadly, taste has shifted. Three years ago, quiet luxury were the words on every buyer, editor, and trend forecaster’s lips. Fast forward, and that trend has resolutely passed, remaining only at the fashion houses that had always done it: Hermès, Brunello Cucinelli, The Row. This shift toward edgy runway propositions that can be readily achieved on a budget through savvy styling, super-fakes, or vintage purchases seems — at first glance — a risky move, particularly if brands are expecting return on investment.
Diesel Spring/Summer 2027.
Photo: Courtesy of Vogue Runway
By doing this, fashion houses are positioning themselves as inversely aspirational, pulling on youth tribes for inspiration and attempting to sell it back to them. The value that the brands need to communicate to consumers is less obvious. Prada’s Fall/Winter 2026 women’s collection — characterized by soiled shirt cuffs, frayed hems, and loose threads — seemed more attuned to the thrifted, cigarette-snagged fashion students than it did jet-setter wardrobes. Equally, Demna’s Gucci has been highly Gen Z led, reliant on runway cameos from underground rappers Fakemink and Nettspend, as well as It-girls Gabbriette and Amelia Gray with smudged, smokey eye makeup. The clothes, pundits comment, look borderline fake, chiming with internet irony, rather than traditional signifiers of quality.
Where brands were once the center of culture, today, young consumers are, argues Bayla Metzger, Archrival’s senior editor for thought leadership. She believes brands are right to be inspired. “While the aesthetics rising right now are messy and confusing, they reflect the psychological state of the next generation,” she says. “Young people face an uncertain future. They’ve heard that AI might wipe out humanity in the next 10 years, and they’re contending with what that means for them.” The result, according to Metzger: Gen Zs balance their drive and ambitions with a more nihilistic worldview, reflected in a return to tanning and — as the runways made clear — smoking.
