In 2015, had anyone known that the newly appointed creative director of Balenciaga would go on to revive couture for the house, fashion eyebrows would have gone up. Regarded then as a rule-defying outsider, Demna (who dropped his surname last year) was parlaying eastern European underground culture into fashion pieces when he took up a post left by a predecessor, unable to energise the 103-year-old fashion house. Six years later, in 2021, the decision to reinstate couture came with the enormity of invoking a discipline so hallowed, no one dared touch it since the most accomplished couturier in history, Spanish-born Cristóbal Balenciaga, shut up salon 54 years ago.
Today, for his second couture outing for Balenciaga,
