Editor’s Notes: Paris, Where Getting Dressed Still Matters
Every season, we spend weeks analyzing the collections, debating silhouettes, and predicting what will define the next year in fashion. Yet some of the most interesting ideas never appear on a runway. They happen outside the shows, where editors, buyers, stylists, photographers, and fashion obsessives dress without a creative director assigning the look.
This Men’s Fashion Week in Paris felt particularly refreshing because it wasn’t about perfection. It was about personality.
The uniform of the season wasn’t really a uniform at all. Crisp poplin shirts were paired with athletic shorts. Polished loafers shared the sidewalk with ballet flats and leather slippers. Tailoring became softer, less corporate, more lived in. The polo shirt quietly replaced the graphic tee, while relaxed trousers, boxer-inspired waistbands, and oversized shirts continued fashion’s long conversation about ease over precision. Nothing felt forced. Nothing looked overstyled. Even the people wearing head-to-toe luxury somehow made it feel accidental.
Color was used with restraint, which made every bold choice stand out even more. A saturated red blazer, electric blue shorts, a cloud of pink satin, or a perfectly faded striped knit became memorable because they interrupted an otherwise understated palette of navy, white, black, stone, chocolate, and pale blue. It reminded me that great style often relies on contrast rather than excess.
One thing became impossible to ignore: fashion has finally stopped separating masculine and feminine wardrobes. Men in pointed kitten heels. Women borrowing oversized shirting and tailored trousers. Delicate jewelry mixed with workwear. Silk next to technical nylon. Leopard prints treated like everyday basics. The conversation is no longer about gender. It’s about proportion, confidence, and individual taste.
What I loved most, however, was the lack of polish. Clothes had wrinkles. Shoes had been walked in. Hair looked like Paris humidity had won. People carried water bottles, handheld fans, oversized totes, and the practical evidence of surviving a long fashion week. For years, street style became almost theatrical—people dressing for photographers rather than for themselves. This season felt like the pendulum had swung back. The best looks looked lived in.
Fashion has always loved contradiction, but Paris is one of the few places where those contradictions feel completely natural. Evening shoes worn before lunch. Tailoring with gym shorts. Couture jewelry with vintage denim. Someone in immaculate white walking beside someone in a pink satin dress and wooden clogs. Somehow, it all makes sense.
Perhaps that’s why Paris continues to produce the most interesting street style in the world. It isn’t because people are chasing trends. It’s because they’re chasing character.
And character never goes out of fashion.
love, Olya
