ISSEY MIYAKE HOMME PLISSE

“Up, up, and away.” The Spring-Summer 2025 show took shape on this injunction, with a promise of flight and movement. In the courtyard of the Mobilier National, admirably staged by Vincent de Belleval, the silhouettes stood out, ready for any destination. From a technique – the art of pleating perfected by Issey Miyake, which became the Pleats Please line in 1993 – all these windy costumes, featherweight coats and atmospheric shirts seem to have sprung forth, giving an immediate sense of travel.

Beyond the performance and innovation, the most striking aspect is the grace and delicacy of a heritage: without weighing anything down, the whole spirit of the designer is present, masterfully embodied by these shapes that are at once concrete and immaterial, functional, and poetic. As the striped panels fluttered in the light, the models emerged, clothed in ensembles whose prints recalled sky views, imaginary cartography and sponge-stamped fresco walls. Neither quite a poncho nor quite a cape, the garment kept the arms free, with a subtle contrast between the polychrome grids and the lines of the pleats, the lightness of the materials, by turns sensual and crunchy like paper; the fluorescents and pastels spanning a diluted fade of parma, mango and watercolour jades. Handkerchief pockets, shirt jackets, accordion pleats, tie-dye in the mist, beauty is there, and above all, agile. 

These celestial origamis celebrate fidelity to a style, a vision, while projecting it in a contemporary way into our own time. A coat hangs over the shoulders with braces; belts are drawstrings; and you get the feeling that a spinnaker canvas is giving momentum to a sailboat – on the open sea, in the city, on the edge of a heatwave and a forecast storm.  Suddenly, the show comes to an end, and the sun returns, inviting itself almost supernaturally into this singularly aerial celebration. “I always look to the future, never to the past. I'm deeply convinced that happiness and joy lie in a positive outlook”, Issey Miyake asserted. A message of life, a confidence clearly conveyed.