Breaking Down the 2025 Luxury Report, From It Bags to New Creative Directors

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In the latest episode, Editor in Chief Kat Collings sits down with Associate Director of Special Projects Kristen Nichols to unpack the 2025 Luxury Report, her annual summary of where where luxury fashion is headed now and what's coming next. You can't talk about luxury fashion in 2025 without mentioning the unprecedented shake-ups at legacy houses—we're talking about more than 20 creative-director swaps!

Kristen and Kat discuss the new energy and anticipation around luxury fashion, the resurgence of preppy staples, the It items defining fashion right now, consumer shopping patterns, and how celebrity influence is shaping brands today. Basically, as prices of these goods rise, there's more emphasis on heritage, storytelling, and artistry, reframing what luxury truly will mean in 2026 and beyond.

For excerpts from the conversation, scroll below.

What would you say are the top houses that had the biggest response and people were most excited about?

One of the first designers to make their debut this year was Michael Rider at Celine. He came from Ralph Lauren, and I think that was ahead of a lot of the director debuts. It presented a new take on preppy style that really translated to some of the big trends we saw and ways people were dressing this year.

Jonathan Anderson at Dior was a very exciting moment. It was just interesting to see how he reframed a lot of the archival references that are so iconic at Dior but then really brought his new vision to them in a way that connects with a new audience but also the existing audience at Dior.