What does Ralph Lauren, Americana magnate, and The Hamptons, Americana incarnate, have to do with Australian fashion? Horses cantered around as guests filed into the brand’s ‘World of Ralph Lauren’ Spring 2025 show – the prelude to NYFW earlier this week.
Muses in the Ralph cosmos – Jude Law, Tom Hiddleston and Laura Dern, to name a few – all took their seats among the usual industry titans to witness uber-supermodels, notably including Naomi Campbell and Christie Turlington proceed down the runway.
For all of the show’s cello-scored, horse-trotting, champagne-sipping spectacle; not a single guest in attendance was without admiration for Mr. Lauren himself. Queer Eye‘s Antoni Porowski, tasked by the brand with being master of ceremonies, got 20 solid minutes out of a massive celebrity cast: many of whom wore the signature uniform – gold buttons, navy blazer, cream chinos – of America’s iconic fashion brand.
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For all of Spring 2025’s on-paper remove from the concerns of reality, it was a collection that – as Colman Domingo phrased it – “is inviting everyone”. In an industry where a scant handful of designers still hold the keys to the Houses they’ve built, Lauren remains a constant: forever at the centre of the literal ‘world’ he’s built.
Drawing on looks from Collection, RRL, Polo, and Purple Label, the clothes themselves were what we’ve come to expect from America’s king of prep. Amply cut tailoring was a dominant theme: imagined this season as white pinstripes, ombre sequins, quilted dressing gowns and nautical-wear.
Then there was that classic Ralph Lauren hat trick: a dinner jacket paired with distressed denim and Yankees dad cap – a masterful way to do ‘statement’ styling.
The vast multiverse of aesthetics Lauren is able to call upon (from the Gatsby-esque formality of Purple Label to RRL’s cowboycore) have enabled him to bring order to a collection that, in a lesser designer’s hands, might unravel at any given moment.
Despite the outward appearance of chaos, there was genuine coherence – Italians might even call it sprezzatura – at work in every outfit. A striped Breton tee with a patchwork overshirt; safety jackets and cream trousers.
For all the brand’s quintessential American flair, there was a worldliness in each puffed pocket square, Paisley trou and piece of patchwork denim: as at home in the streets of Sydney or Marrakech, as in New York.
Needless to say: a day upstate, taking in the sea air has never looked so good.
Watch the entire Ralph Lauren Spring 2025 runway below.
