At Carolina Herrera, Nouvelle Society for a New Generation
Véronique Hyland
·1 min read
Colorfully plumed fish starred in the teasers for Carolina Herrera spring 2025, a sign that creative director Wes Gordon would likely be leaning in an ornamental direction. And indeed, for today’s show, he looked to bright hues, particularly yellow, and polka dots— both house signatures since the 1980s.
Each cherry-red seat had a pink rose and a Georgia O’Keeffe quote placed on it, one that seemed to sum up Gordon’s approach: “I found that I could say things with color and shapes that I couldn’t say in any other way—things that I had no words for.” With Karlie Kloss, Nina Dobrev, Chloe Fineman, and Liza Koshy seated front row and the house founder herself in attendance, Gordon assembled his own vocabulary of color and shape, offering a ladylike take on the decade’s more opulent side.
To the strains of an all-Janet Jackson soundtrack, models paraded around an indoor fountain feature, sporting looks that updated the codes of Nouvelle Society in a youthful way, with bare midriffs and cutouts aplenty. Polka dots mixed in different color palettes or juxtaposed with oversized florals kept the overall effect from feeling stuffy. As did the styling choices, like a houndstooth coat worn on its own, over bare décolletage.
The house’s iconic white shirt was interpreted from fresh angles (for example, tucked into high-waisted Bermuda shorts.) And of course, there were Herrera standbys like full skirts, exaggerated sleeves and shoulders, oversized rosettes and bold hues of red and pink. Many of the models sported yellow blooms in their hair; surely O’Keeffe would have approved.