The Skirt Won
Prada sent out 63 looks and not one pair of trousers. By the end of the month the skirt was doing everything. Crinoline, sweater, pannier, power suit.
Prada called its Spring Summer 2027 show The Skirt, and then did exactly that. On 22 September in Milan, Miuccia Prada and Raf Simons sent out 63 looks and every single one was built around a skirt. No trousers. No dresses. Just skirts, and whatever you’d throw on top.
By the time Paris got going, people were turning up to shows in their own knee length skirts. That’s how fast this one moved.
She told us twenty years ago
None of this came out of nowhere. Back in 2006, Miuccia Prada said on television: “The skirt for me is like a T-shirt.” Meaning a uniform, but one you can bend any way you want. Around the same time the house put together Waist Down, an exhibition of Prada skirts made between 1998 and 2004 that went on to travel the world.
So a whole collection of skirts is less a new idea and more a twenty year callback. This time she has a co designer, and a show that treats the skirt as what she called a canvas.
“One of the most primitive, instrumental pieces of clothing in history for men and women.”
What the skirts actually did
This is where it gets fun, because “it’s a skirt” is doing a lot of heavy lifting.
A whole run of them were basic wraps held shut with wide bands of Velcro, and the Velcro was the thing they embroidered, with clusters of crystals on top. The scratchy closure you’d normally hide became the fancy part. Another group wore the crinoline on the outside, the cage that usually lives under a skirt now sitting over it, like the skirt was being kept under glass. Some fabrics were lying to you: cotton treated to pass as leather or suede. And under shiny black nylon overskirts there were florals and plaids peeking out.
On top? Sweaters, shirts, and a lot of tiny bras worn as tops.
12 of the 63 skirts
- 01Look 4. Grey, knee length, with a bra top.
- 02Look 11. Grey wrap with a purple embroidered band.
- 03Look 18. Pale blue under a black leather jacket.
- 04Look 20. A pale pink skirt under black.
- 05Look 21. A pale skirt with a bright waistband.
- 06Look 41. Full black skirt, black bra top.
- 07Look 42. Black skirt under a dark sweater.
- 08Look 49. Black wrap skirt, dark knit over printed sleeves.
- 09Look 55. Grey skirt with a layer knotted at the waist.
- 10Look 58. Black wrap skirt with a red tie, grey bra top.
- 11Look 60. Grey skirt with big press studs, black bandeau.
- 12Look 63. The last look. White skirt with a green stripe.
Photos: Gorunway.com / Vogue Runway
Up close
- 13Detail, Look 11. The embroidered band, closer.
- 14Detail. A black wrap skirt with a pink embroidered band, and the bag.
- 15Look 48. Crinoline on the outside, in yellow.
Photos: Gorunway.com / Vogue Runway. Detail frames matched to looks by us.
Then everyone else
Once you start looking, skirts are everywhere this season, and they’re doing a lot more than hanging there.
At Miu Miu, the show opened on knee length checked skirts with blazers, the same length Prada had just made official. Later Olivia Colman made her runway debut in a black leather skirt suit, and the audience audibly oohed. At MM6 Maison Margiela, a sweater was worn as a skirt, and the studio says it invented something it calls a “hip-paulette” to give it crinoline style volume at the hips. And at Cecilie Bahnsen, the structured pannier pieces went on over trousers and jeans, with frames reported to be removable or adjustable.
Across the month
- 16Miu Miu, Look 5. A checked knee length skirt with a blazer.
- 17Miu Miu, Look 24. Olivia Colman in the black leather skirt suit.
- 18MM6 Maison Margiela, Look 41. A striped sweater worn as a skirt.
- 19MM6, detail. The striped sweater skirt, closer.
- 20Cecilie Bahnsen, Look 9. A striped pannier top over dark trousers.
- 21Cecilie Bahnsen, Look 20. A sheer embroidered peplum over jeans.
Photos: Gorunway.com / Vogue Runway. Cecilie Bahnsen: Alessandro Lucioni / Gorunway.com / Vogue Runway.
Our read
Three things are going on, and they’re all useful if you get dressed in the morning.
The length is the knee. Not mini, not maxi. The most boring length on paper turned out to be the one everyone wanted, maybe because it works with a sweater and with a bra top.
The skirt is now a layer. MM6 and Bahnsen both treat it like something you add on top of what you’re already wearing, not a choice instead of trousers. Skirt over jeans is officially not a mistake.
And the structure moved outside. Crinoline over the skirt at Prada, padded volume at the hip at MM6, frames over trousers at Bahnsen. The stuff that used to be hidden is now the design. We love that, because it’s the same thing we look for in every show: the moment construction stops hiding.
Miuccia called the skirt a T-shirt twenty years ago. This season everyone finally believed her.
Knee length skirt over jeans, yes or no?
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