With the SS25 menswear season wrapped, we dive into the themes and trends we saw across London, Milan and Paris.

To suggest that a fashion show had something of a theatrical edge is not a groundbreaking insight, but for men’s SS25 numerous collections played on the tropes and characters of the theatre, making it hard to miss it. Most obviously, Walter Van Beirendonck’s entire SS25 collection was inspired by clowns. Wearing little party hats, oversized trousers, and polka dots, the models trundled down the runway to a soundtrack of distorted, electro circus music.

Colm Dillane of KidSuper collaborated with Cirque du Soleil to create a runway where the models became marionettes. Their wrists were strung up for a runway that consisted of dandyish suits and ruffs. Naturally, there was a model on stilts and the collection’s final look was modelled by a headless figure in a coat covered in images of clowns.

Rick Owens had a whole Busby Berkeley-like production for his SS25 menswear show as battalions of models marched around the Palais de Tokyo. Much like KidSuper, Rick had a whole moving frame of acrobatic performers who posed in wild positions.

Charles Jeffrey threw a party in a way that only Charles Jeffrey can for his tenth anniversary show in London. Outfits had cartoonish arrows shot through them, armour was all lumpy and bumpy, it was like a theatre’s costume box had exploded. Naturally, Beth Ditto came out at the end and everything turned into a very LOVERBOY disco.

But perhaps the most ‘theatrical’ of the lot was Dsquared2 with their Magic Mike-inspired opening number. The show began with shirtless dancers appearing in hovering clear boxes who then hit the stage for a sex-charged number complete with grinding hips, shredded abs and rising temperatures.