Anthony Vaccarello Exits Saint Laurent After a Decade
After a decade at the helm, Anthony Vaccarello has left Saint Laurent. In retrospect, his gilded S/S 27 collection was a swan song, from the handover of the keys to Charlotte Gainsbourg’s live serenade. Vaccarello joined the house in 2016 and spent ten years sharpening its identity around sex appeal, strong-shouldered tailoring, and evening silhouettes, anchoring each season with a show under the Eiffel Tower that became one of the most anticipated fixtures on the Paris calendar. He also ventured into film, establishing Saint Laurent Productions in 2023 to produce short and feature-length films, a move that underscored how seriously he took the house’s cultural ambitions beyond fashion. “Through his creative vision and exacting standards, he has contributed to strengthening the enduring influence of one of France’s greatest couture houses, as we embark on a new chapter in its history,” said Kering CEO Luca de Meo. Vaccarello will receive the International Designer of the Year trophy at the CFDA Fashion Awards on November 2 in New York, and is also among six nominees for Designer of the Year at the Fashion Awards on November 30 in London. It has been widely reported that Chemena Kamali, currently creative director of Chloé and no stranger to the house having served as women’s ready-to-wear design director under Vaccarello from 2016 to 2023, is set to succeed him. [Business of Fashion] [WWD]
LVMH and Kering Have Raised the Minimum Age for Models to 18
Nine years after signing their first joint charter on models’ working conditions, LVMH and Kering have strengthened their commitments and set the minimum age for models representing adults in fashion shows and photo shoots to 18, an extension of an existing commitment for Kering and a raise from 16 for LVMH. The updated charter also establishes zero tolerance for any form of harassment, abuse, or violence, tighter regulation of situations involving nudity or partial nudity with prior formal agreement now required, a strengthened anonymous reporting procedure that can be activated at any point during a collaboration, and unannounced audits at workplaces. Awareness and training programs will be put in place for brands, agencies, and all teams involved in castings, shows, and shoots, and the new rules will take effect starting with the next Paris Fashion Week in 2027. “Through this initiative, LVMH reaffirms that the protection of models is not an isolated action but a commitment shared by all players in the industry,” said Antoine Arnault. [LVMH]
Elizaveta Porodina Publishes Her First Book, Found Dreams
Elizaveta Porodina’s first monograph, Found Dreams, published by Prestel and edited by Nadine Barth, is out now as a 240-page hardcover with 180 color illustrations, structured as a five-chapter odyssey into the human subconscious and tracing recurring archetypes of the mother, heroine, warrior, and shadow across a body of work that includes her celebrated collaborations with Jessie Buckley, Paul Mescal, and Ariana Grande, who wrote the foreword. Porodina’s background in clinical psychology is inseparable from her practice, each image functioning less as a photograph than as a psychological landscape built in close collaboration with her subjects. “Dreams occupy this enormous territory within human existence that we still understand remarkably little about,” she told us. “I’m fascinated by the possibility that art can sometimes approach these territories differently than language, numbers or scientific models can. Not necessarily to explain them, but to give them a form. In that sense, Found Dreams became my attempt to give some kind of structure to that territory.” The book concludes with a conversation between Porodina and philosopher Dr. Victoria Trumbull, author of On the Memory of the Soul, which she describes as “almost trying to think through what a dream actually is and what it might reveal about the nature of perception itself. The book doesn’t try to answer that question definitively. I think it creates a space in which the question can exist.” Models.com, asked what making it revealed about herself. “Found Dreams spans more than three years of my life,” she said, “and maybe the biggest discovery was that giving up control didn’t make the work less mine. Sometimes it allowed more of me into it.” Ariana Grande, describes Porodina as “a once-in-a-lifetime visual storyteller who balances raw humanness with whimsy playfulness, dancing between darkness and light, in a most ethereal way that only she can.” Elizaveta Porodina: Found Dreams edited by Nadine Barth and Elizaveta Porodina © 2026 Prestel Publishing, is available here.
The Magical Dream, Model: Awek Gak, Featured in: OD Beauty, February 2023, Photography Elizaveta Porodina
Barrie x Damien Hirst Cashmere Collection Is Coming
Scottish cashmere house Barrie, part of the Métiers d’Art ecosystem of Chanel since 2012, has collaborated with Damien Hirst on a seven-piece cashmere wardrobe launching October 14, translating his signature Spots and Butterflies motifs into knitwear through Barrie’s historic mill in Hawick, Scotland, where Hirst has been a longstanding client. Each piece is individually numbered from 1 to 100 per colorway, with a zip-up and round neck in the Spot motif and a hoodie and pants set in the Butterfly motif available in white, black, red, and green, complemented by a blanket, cashmere scarves, cotton T-shirts, embroidered patches, and a range of Collectibles that nod to museum shop souvenirs. Available from October 14 on Barrie.com and in Barrie boutiques across Europe, Korea, and the Americas, and from November 10 in China, Japan, and Taiwan.
Photo by Félix Dol-Maillot, Image courtesy of Barrie + Damien Hirst
Boucheron Is Staging Its Largest U.S. Exhibition at Christie’s New York
For a house with nearly 170 years of history, Boucheron remains less immediately recognisable to American consumers than Cartier or Tiffany, and In Focus: A Monograph of a Visionary, which opened at Christie’s New York today and runs through October 18, is a direct response to that gap. Staged at 20 Rockefeller Plaza and organised across four thematic chapters – Nature, Architecture, Couture, and Culture – the exhibition pairs archival masterpieces with the U.S. debut of creative director Claire Choisne’s 2026 Carte Blanche high jewelry collection, Human Being, framing nearly 170 years of the maison’s output as a continuous design lineage. Among the archival highlights is the iconic Question Mark necklace from 1889, named for its shape that wrapped around the neck without a clasp, and a 1924 tiara commissioned as a wedding gift for a great-niece of J.P. Morgan. The exhibition is open to the public daily. [WWD]
Jean-Charles de Castelbajac Has Reimagined Barbie and Ken
Jean-Charles de Castelbajac, one of fashion’s most joyful figures, has collaborated with Barbie to reimagine the iconic dolls through his signature language of bold primary colours, playful imagery, and his iconic teddy bear motif, with both Barbie and Ken dressed in doll-sized recreations of his legendary teddy bear coat. Barbie wears a high-neck T-shirt dress covered in Castelbajac-style illustrations with denim boots, while the collection is completed by a certificate of authenticity, making each piece as much a collectible as it is a fashion object. Priced at $150 each, the dolls are available exclusively on Mattel Creations.
Jean-Charles de Castelbajac, Image courtesy of Jean-Charles de Castelbajac + Mattel Creations
Rachel Ojuromi Walked Her Way Through Lagos Into Chanel
After recreating Matthieu Blazy’s Chanel Métiers d’Art show on the streets of Lagos, Rachel Ojuromi just walked Blazy’s Chanel Spring/Summer 2027 runway in Paris and made it happen her way. The filmmaker, creative director, and founder of The Process Africa talks about turning the streets of Lagos into her personal runway, finding her walk after wearing heels for the first time last year, and why getting into the room means nothing if she can’t bring others with her. Don’t miss the full interview with editorial director, Irene Ojo-Felix here.
Laëtitia Gimenez Adam Doesn’t Believe in a Styling Formula
“Fashion has always fascinated me. It felt like a world that was both incredibly desirable and somehow inaccessible,” says Laëtitia Gimenez Adam, Fashion Director, stylist, and Models.com’s latest Behind the Image creative. Describing her work as instinctive and intimate rather than guided by any one formula, Adam has built visual fantasies as Fashion Director of Purple Magazine. She reflects on her past role at Balenciaga, the biggest challenges she’s faced in the industry, and the advice she has for the next generation of stylists. Hit the link here for the exclusive interview.
In Paris: Big Ideas, Bigger Spectacles
Paris Fashion Week closed out Spring/Summer 2027 with ingenuity and provocation, from Matieres Fecales asking who fashion’s fantasies really belong to, Haider Ackermann’s Tom Ford reclaiming self-possessed sensuality, and Nicolas Ghesquiere ending the week on an ethereal note at Louis Vuitton. Paris proved that the best collections either ask the right questions or answer them. You can get free access to the full MDC Talent Watch Report until the end of day. For more data-driven insights combining Models.com industry intelligence with Instagram trend analysis, head to Models.com/Pro.
How Fashion’s Creatives Are Finding Independence
In the latest Pro News feature, Robyn Mowatt discusses how fashion creatives are finding independence in a publication world that used to be gate-kept. Now, influential voices are emerging in increasingly independent ways, with journalists, writers, content creators, and cultural critics taking up space on their own terms and directing their influence into newer ecosystems. This exclusive Pro News article is available only to Pro members.
MDC Selects: Meet the New Faces Navigating Existential Books, Irrational Fears, and Late-Bloomer Dreams
Get to know the latest MDC Selects of the week from around the globe here.
Street Style Paris S/S 27 Pt. 3
Au revoir Paris! That is all for Women’s Paris Fashion Week Spring/Summer 2027! Thank you, Melodie Jeng, for capturing some of the best off-duty model looks. To see all your favorite models looks from the season go here.
