What is Couture in a Digital Age?
PHOTOGRAPHY JESSICA MADAVO
STYLING ENIOLA DARE
A new cohort of designers are using the digital tools of their generation to power couture-level creations and build an exclusive clientele eager to invest in them. Anders Christian Madsen meets five modern couturiers.
In a season dominated by big designer moves and billion-dollar haute couture houses, a new generation of dressmakers are taking matters into their own hands. On social media, young super-talents devoted to pure creation are intuitively forming a network of virtual couture salons. For the one-percenters who discover these designers on their feeds, placing an order doesn’t require private jets to Paris, front-row smooching and intimate client appointments in the 8th arrondissement. But in many cases, the level of craftsmanship and the time that goes into their creations (not to mention the price tags) easily meet the mandates of haute couture. Defying a brutal fashion system where independence — let alone handmade clothes — can often be an unforgiving path, these designers are harnessing digital innovation to stay true to their craft and their passion.
FATOU WEARS THE FINALE ARCH GOWN, STEVE O SMITH, FALL/WINTER 2025
In a world where things are becoming automated, there is still such a romanticism to working with your hands
STEVE O SMITH
Steve O Smith developed his signature technique while doing his MA at Central Saint Martins during lockdown. “We had to communicate so much through the screen. That’s partially how I ended up with a style that’s so impactful in imagery.” The British designer hand-cuts his designs like drawings, creating illusions of brushstrokes through an intricate practice founded in appliqué and relief. Inviting the eye to look closer, his work is true fashion magic as illustrated by the creative processes revealed on his Instagram. “In a world where things are becoming automated, there is still such a romanticism to working with your hands. Ironically, I try to use social media to communicate craft because that’s what people want to see.” When Smith exercised his trompe l’oeil on Eddie Redmayne and his wife Hannah Bagshawe for last year’s Met Gala, couture clients descended upon his profile. “It’s through word of mouth and a lot of it’s through online. The customers have taught me so much about how couture works: the different houses, price points and all that.” His creations range between $11,500 and $27,000. Each is weeks in the making and as artisanal as it gets. He works with a tailor to complete the suiting, but from start to finish, a dress never leaves his London studio. “The V&A just bought a piece. Only me and my assistant had our hands on that garment. It’s completely handmade.” Eight years into his business, Smith only sells to private clients but releases a small couture level collection every six months to show his evolution. “Every season it gets more intricate. The finale gown from last season was an astonishing amount of appliqué. And kind of insane to make.”
STEVE O SMITH’S DESK AT HIS STUDIO IN LONDON
It’s exciting to think that the feedback to ornate work seen through a 2D image can be so positive.
PAOLO CARZANA
Paolo Carzana has a complicated relationship with computers. “My research is genuinely physical: books and first-hand. I don’t work on Illustrator or Photoshop or anything like that. I’m not a computer whizz by any means. But I’m trying to get better at emailing and things like that.” His devotion to pure creation courses through the soulful draping that defines his aesthetic: gauzy, ghostly garments organically handdyed and gowned over the anatomy like dampened muslin. From the pieces he sells to stores, to the custom orders that come in on his Instagram, every pleat and fold is placed by his own hand. The Welsh designer, who completed his MA at Central Saint Martins in 2020, lives for his craft: “The hardships can be quite extreme,” he says of life as an independent designer. “But I know that this is what I’m meant to be doing. I have to do this.” In the survival game that is the business of a young dressmaker, Carzana says social media is a double-edged sword: “I have a weird relationship with it. There’s been a rise in fashion accounts talking negatively about the industry. No matter where you are or where you come from, I think it’s really, really hard to be designing and trying to run a business, and I just want to clear my mind of any negativity. But as a vehicle to reach customers, Instagram is very useful. I now only have my label’s account — not my own — which is good, because I’m closed off from the noise.” Alongside special orders, he uses his account to announce sporadic sales of the toiles that inform his creations, which can be worn in their own right. “It’s exciting to think that the feedback to ornate work seen through a 2D image can be so positive.”
MAJDA WEARS HEADWEAR, NASIR MAZHAR FOR PAOLO CARZANA AND DRESS, PAOLO CARZANA, DRAGONS UNWINGED AT THE BUTCHERS BLOCK ENSEMBLE, FALL/WINTER 2025
It’s not just about selling product, it’s about creating a community where you can express your ideas and beliefs.
TORISHÉJU DUMI
Torishéju Dumi isn’t actually a fan of social media. “I grew up in the 1990s,” she says, validating her disposition. “But it’s what we have to work with and I work with it to the best of my ability. I post what’s genuine to me, and what feels right. It’s not just about selling product, it’s about creating a community where you can express your ideas and beliefs. My brand is all about world building.” After the British designer released her debut collection in 2023 — setting the tone for the abstract, crafted, ceremonial silhouette that distinguishes her Torishéju label — her Instagram profile turned into a virtual couture salon. “People started messaging me about purchasing the collection. A quite extravagant, influential person from Nigeria messaged me to buy a hat. Then Andrew Bolton contacted me.” The head curator of the Costume Institute ended up ordering a number of pieces for the Metropolitan Museum of Art. When Dumi dressed Kendall Jenner for this year’s Met Gala, the messages multiplied. “We received five requests just for wedding dresses.” With creations priced between $34,000 and $50,000 that’s no insignificant turnover, but the artisanal value of the Central Saint Martins alum’s work merits the couture prices. “That’s where I want to position the brand. I like taking time to make pieces rather than mass-producing. And when we make special pieces for clients, all the pieces are made from deadstock.” The approach isn’t just a reflection of sustainability, but an expression of the one-of-a-kind label attached to haute couture: because the designer only works with the deadstock fabric she’s got on hand, no two Torishéju creations are ever the same.
NAYONIKAA WEARS BLAZER, BLACK TUTU SKIRT AND WHITE TUTU SKIRT, TORISHÉJU, SPRING/SUMMER 2025
I’m sending it directly to the person, I can actually communicate with them,
even if they’re on the other side of the planet
YAKU STAPLETON
Yaku Stapleton is inspired by Afrofuturism and the digital role-playing games he grew up playing. Three-dimensional, textural and thoroughly trippy, his sensory performance-wear and workwear is made in the images of dinosaurs and aliens. “I’m exploring this idea of my family in this limitless RPG world. Over the last few seasons, it’s been about defining who the characters are and building their stories within this story. People are starting to recognize the characters and understand who they are,” he says. When Stapleton posts a new garment to his brand Yaku’s Instagram — usually complemented by an earnest caption that captures his personality — it’s met with enthralled commentary from his niche but sizeable following. To the designer, who grew up in St Albans, the community spirit of social media matches his formative introduction to fashion. “My entry point to making clothes was for friends and people in my city. I would ride my bike to their house and drop in the T-shirt.” Today — two years after earning his MA from Central Saint Martins and collaborating with the likes of Nike, MSCHF and Reebok — that format has expanded to new dimensions. “Someone will reach out on DM and say, ‘I really love this bag but I can’t find it anywhere.’ Then you’re like, what type of person really wants this dinosaur-shaped bag? Then we’ll talk about references and what led us both to being interested in it,” he says, emphasizing the emotional and almost-anthropological benefits of direct-to-customer business. “Because I’m sending it directly to the person, I can actually communicate with them, even if they’re on the other side of the planet.”
YUKI T WEARS MEGA D. TOON JACKET, CHARCOAL ARC PANT, ANIMAL PELT BELT, BASKET BAG O’FISH, YAKU, FALL/WINTER 2025
As a rebellious person who has been creating my own rules, community has been an important thing to me. That community grew into customers.
DILARA FINDIKOGLU
“For my generation of independent designers, Instagram has become our shop window,” Dilara Findikoglu says. “We didn’t have the funds to open a store — which is still my dream — but with technology you can build that world on a screen and make people believe in you.” Upon her graduation from Central Saint Martins in 2015, the Turkish-British designer steadily built a social media community around her gothic, punkish, romanticist collections. “As a rebellious person who has been creating my own rules, community has been an important thing to me. That community grew into customers,” she explains, from the women who buy the ready-to-wear she sells in stores to those who DM her with orders for more painstaking pieces, such as the knife dress she showed for fall/winter 2023. “But knife dresses aren’t that intricate. They’re more time-consuming. The knives are antique so we have to handpick them all. But the hair pieces we do are so intricate, because you have to hand-braid each strand. The tattoo dress requires a tattoo artist to hand-tattoo the whole thing, and you only have one chance to get it right.” Next to private clients, the London-based designer’s digital community has attracted a posse of famous fans who have propelled her into the spotlight. She’s now on WhatsApp with Kim Kardashian, while the unravelling Victorian corset dress Bella Hadid wore to a 2022 Met Gala afterparty is her most requested creation ever. When it comes to exclusivity, however, Findikoglu observes the commandments of couture: “To this day, I have never made that dress for anybody else and I never will.”
NETH WEARS JOAN’S KNIVES DRESS, DILARA FINDIKOGLU, FALL/WINTER 2023
Photography Jessica Madavo at Concrete Rep
Styling Eniola Dare
Hair Mayuko Nakae using Oribe
Makeup Marina Belfon-Rose
Models Beth Robbins at Nevs, Fatou Kebbeh at Next, Kerlual at Menace,
Majda John Peter at Elite, Nayonikaa Shetty at IMG and Yuki T.
Casting Piergiorgio Del Moro for DM Casting.
Set Design Theo Neilson
Read next:
— The Fantasy and Reality of Fashion’s First Influencer: Marie Antoinette Style Opens at the V&A
— Juergen Teller’s New Exhibition Started as a Love Letter
Michael Kors Takes London Michael Kors Takes London
Michael Kors Takes London
Antony Price returns to the runway with 16Arlington Antony Price returns to the runway with 16Arlington
Antony Price returns to the runway with 16Arlington
He Shaped the Vocabulary of Modern Shoe Design. Fashion Forgot. He Shaped the Vocabulary of Modern Shoe Design. Fashion Forgot.
He Shaped the Vocabulary of Modern Shoe Design. Fashion Forgot.
Swarovski Opens Masters of Light in Hollywood Swarovski Opens Masters of Light in Hollywood
Swarovski Opens Masters of Light in Hollywood
Christian Louboutin’s Timeless Reinvention Christian Louboutin’s Timeless Reinvention
Christian Louboutin’s Timeless Reinvention
10 Minutes of Talking Style With A$AP Rocky 10 Minutes of Talking Style With A$AP Rocky
10 Minutes of Talking Style With A$AP Rocky
Meryll Rogge’s Free Spirit Meryll Rogge’s Free Spirit
Meryll Rogge’s Free Spirit
Matthieu Blazy’s Chanel Debut Matthieu Blazy’s Chanel Debut
