Before Balenciaga’s AW24 show began, editors and guests received a special delivery to their hotels and homes: a brown package sealed with eBay branded tape. “The Winter 24 collection is a random object found on eBay, the platform used by Demna to search for antique collectibles,” the printed-off proof of purchase read inside, along with a “unique and personal found object selected by Demna, representing memorabilia from someone’s past.” If you weren’t lucky enough to receive one of the creative director’s treasures on your front porch, then all is not lost – read on for everything you need to know about Balenciaga’s AW24 show.

WHAT’S YOUR SCREEN TIME?

It turns out that the eBay invite was a bit of a Trojan horse. Rather than preface a collection about trawling the internet for the best bargains one can find, the invite was actually about receiving an object that “carries a strong emotional value… which is important to recognise in our ever digital world.” Cue, Demna’s digital deluge, a show space where the walls and floors were one giant screen, a sensory overload of moving images and white noise.

Rather than standard show notes, the designer decided to drop a voice note instead, where he asked what fashion and luxury meant in “a world oversaturated by content”. The screens themselves flashed up Easter egg, AI-generated images that not only felt like scrolling madly through Instagram, but also referenced Demna’s Balenciaga archive, travelling through the tacky souvenir shop aesthetics that peppered his early collections, via cute fluffy animals, and neon-lit Parisian cityscapes.

DEMNA’S CREW CAME OUT IN FORCE

Each season the Balenciaga frow draws in an even more stratospheric crowd, and this morning was no different. The label’s Fall 2024 show – a love letter to Los Angeles – attracted a coterie of stars including Samara Weaving, Sexyy Red, Ashton Sanders and Kendall Jenner, and this season’s guestlist was just as stacked.

Demna’s bestie, former Miss Westie Kim K was back, as was Balenciaga ambassador Nicole Kidman, and actor Rachel Sennot. Isabelle Huppert, another brand ambassador, also made an appearance, as did Serena Williams, Luka Sabbat, and current Dazed cover star Vittoria Ceretti. And despite his own busy design schedule, Raf Simons also managed to make his way down, turning up to see what Demna had been quietly working on all season.

HALTERNECK HYBRIDS AND FROZEN DRAPE DRESSES

When the show began, items including a gabardine trench, tailored coat, leather jacket and black dress shirt were all reconfigured into halterneck dresses, the collar of each item looped around models’ necks and the rest of the garment dropping to the front. The effect was initially one of confusion, as if disembodied heads were floating above flat-laid garments, then models turned to the side and we could see the rest of the fabric cut into a dress. Elsewhere, trousers and jeans were inverted, their legs wrapped around models’ necks to make more halters, while Balenciaga branded gym bags were also remade into dresses and tops.

At the other end of the spectrum, Demna also presented a selection of evening dresses that contrasted with these hybrid creations. Referred to as “frozen drape dresses”, what we should have seen was the movement of flowing pleats when models emerged, but instead we only got immovable, starched fabric that barely shifted as they did. Again, the effect was uncanny, yet another example of Demna making the familiar feel quite absurd.

CYBERPUNK CITIZENS OF THE WORLD UNITE

Keeping in theme with the frenetic digital space, a motley crew of cyberpunk baddies appeared towards the end of the show. They wore dresses made from hemmed together tops, with slogans like ‘Keep calm and wear this Balenciaga t-shirt’ on the front; they had stacks of necklace charms around their necks and their bodies were wrapped in lashings of tape; some eve sported sweaters with faux emblems on the front, like the Planet Hollywood logo remade to say Planet Earth. One model also hit the runway in a frock made from three stitched hoodies that created a mermaid tail at its bottom, and in show notes Demna described this as a modern take on the iconic Balenciaga balloon dress.

AN UNDERGARMENT GOWN

After hacking and smashing all these different items and ideas, the show stopping finale look came in the form of a dress made from multiple pairs of pants and bras, stacked and stitched together in tiers. It was Demna’s ironic inversion of expected dress codes, taking all the look-at-me grandeur of a ball gown but making it in garments that would normally be hidden away.

DEMNA’S AESTHETIC PROJECT

In the voice note shared before the show, Demna communicated that “this collection is about the aesthetic that I have been evolving in fashion for exactly ten years now. It is about identifying with and belonging to this aesthetic. It is also about the fashion that matters to me.” While this is true, and the collection consisted of numerous styles that Demna perfected, he also made it clear that the show would pay homage to the brand’s legacy, too. “I wanted this show to represent a link between the past and the future of Balenciaga,” said the designer, and he did so by referencing Cristóbal Balenciaga in the embellished dresses that first appeared on the runway, the aforementioned homage to the balloon dress, and also the trouser halter tops, which were informed by Cristóbal’s balloon jackets, also called ‘La Vareuse’.