Glenn Martens will make his debut as the brand new artistic director of Maison Margiela with a couture present in July, WWD has realized.
The Paris style home confirmed that the Belgian designer would begin with a Maison Margiela Artisanal present for the autumn 2025 season. The runway occasion is being scheduled throughout Haute Couture Week, scheduled for July 7 to 10 within the French capital.
“This marks the start of an inspiring new chapter for the maison, rooted in our core artistic values and formed by Margiela’s couture heritage. Underneath Glenn’s course, couture will proceed to ignite creativity for the model and drive boundary pushing designs,” Maison Margiela mentioned in an announcement shared completely with WWD.
Maison Margiela Artisanal collections have been a part of the calendar since 2006 as a member of the Chambre Syndicale de la Haute Couture. In 2012, Maison Margiela was formally named an high fashion home.
Nonetheless, the corporate final introduced an Artisanal assortment for spring 2024, a blockbuster that ended up being the swan track of British designer John Galliano, who spent 10 years main the home. That seminal present gained common acclaim, put full-throttle creativity again on the trade agenda and propelled Galliano again to the very prime of style’s artistic heap.
Final January, Margiela’s dad or mum firm OTB Group introduced that Martens, already artistic director of its Diesel model in Milan, would succeed Galliano and construct on the home’s “distinctive codes and model values.”
That announcement didn’t specify when Martens would possibly present his first assortment for the model, whereas remaining on the artistic helm of Diesel.
“Glenn, who studied at Antwerp’s Royal Academy of High quality Arts like Martin [Margiela], has already proven his prowess and his imaginative and prescient in couture,” OTB Group chairman Renzo Rosso mentioned on the time, referring to the one-off high fashion assortment Martens did for Jean Paul Gaultier again in 2022 because the second visitor expertise on the Puig-owned home.
Martens’ debut at Maison Margiela will contribute to a newsy couture week, which is able to function the swan track Balenciaga couture assortment by Demna, who’s turning into artistic director of Gucci, one other Kering model; the return of Iris Van Herpen, who’s now adopting an annual cadence for high fashion, and an award celebration and still-life presentation combo for Giambattista Valli.
Martens has but to reveal his design intentions, whereas stressing he’s “extraordinarily honored to affix the superb Maison Margiela, a very distinctive home that has been inspiring the world for many years.”
The affable designer rose to style fame due to his 11-year stint helming Y/Venture, which earned a cult following for its twisted constructions, however shuttered earlier this 12 months when it couldn’t discover a purchaser to rescue it from monetary woes.
To make sure, Rosso has lengthy had Martens on his radar, tapping him in 2018 as a visitor designer of his experimental capsule sequence Diesel Purple Tag, one 12 months after Martens bagged the celebrated ANDAM style prize, of which OTB is a historic sponsor and mentor.
In October 2020, Rosso named Martens the full-time artistic director of Diesel. He definitely suits the mould of the daring, edgy abilities favored by the Italian style entrepreneur, who famously recruited Galliano in 2014 to guide Maison Margiela.
Martens grew up within the Belgian metropolis of Bruges and graduated from Antwerp’s Royal Academy of High quality Arts in 2008. Jean Paul Gaultier noticed his commencement present and instantly conscripted him as junior designer for his girls’s pre-collection and the G2 males’s label.
Martens would go on to affix Y/Venture in 2010 and take the artistic helm of that model in 2013, accruing a status for revolutionary slicing and an experimental strategy to style.
The designer, 41, likes to tumble collectively disparate references, from classical tailoring to streetwear to offbeat historic references, together with Flemish Previous Masters. He’s additionally identified for his avant-garde silhouettes that incorporate exaggerated and twisting volumes.
OTB grew to become the principle shareholder of Maison Margiela in 2002 and took full management in 2006.
Diesel fall 2025
Giovanni Giannoni/WWD
