Cyber-pop meets craft at Seoul Fashion Week ‘25

It’s giving cyber-pop. 

With its return on Tuesday, Seoul is already bustling with trends and designs to take cues from. Which means, of course we've kept our pens clicking and notepads ready—streetwear is going to get versatile. With a display curated by a total of 21 designers, this time the fashion week is all game for harmony and synchronicity as well as sustainability and upcycling. We’re witnessing ruffles, pleats, plaids, and vibrancy as well as dystopian roots with the stretchable panels on display this season. Promoting androgynous clothing and diversifying silhouettes and structures, this season is all for those who live for comfort, edge and beyond the confines of a mere aesthetic.

Macrame, a resurrection

Back in flesh and breathing. Paying homage to the knot-tying craft, a brand is bringing back labor-intensive work in fashion to the spotlight. 

Macrame, known for its ever-fluid, evolving nature with every differing knot, steps out as a hot topic of the 60s and 70s and serves as a new trend of the season. Making it up the evolutionary ladder, this craft was historically rooted in Babylonian and Assyrian carvings, as well as Arabic practices of knotting the excess of the cloth. Eventually with the women adopting it as a hobby in Victorian days, the craft had its moment of popularity. With the noise and wonder dying down, macrame globally took a side seat. Until now. 

A comeback was fated to be, especially if you had knitwear and crochets leading this summer. 

LIE SS25 philosophises craftsmanship and delivers in macrame. Talking the talk with embroidered moon extension, headsets, and a statement hat in crimson, all macrame. We prophesize that it’s just the beginning of the craft in meta-modern times of design. 

Prominence of neckties

T’is the season, mon cherie. Of course, we’re talking about neck-ties. If you haven’t yet come across the season’s newfound love for them as the autumn hails itself, allow us. Forgotten and ignored, no more, neckties are back with Seoul fashion week. 

Usually associated with the monotony of school uniforms and corporate, neckties are finally giving themselves space to breathe. Take it from Boygenuis at the Grammys and Danielle from Newjeans at the Seoul Fashion Week ‘25, neck ties can be fun too. 

Tied loosely around the collar, atop a white shirt as seen in the collection curated by Phenomenon Seeper, a necktie becomes a versatile accessory. The designer explores embroidery, ornamentation over the same as well as uniform prints to put his point across the board that dressing up polished is back on track. Meanwhile, one designer explores the versatility of the accessory, and the other speaks on form. Cokie blends in thinner neckties with bold, edgy looks paired with an oversized shirt or crop alongside a flared pant, leather shorts or a tailored one. 

We’re having a Jersey moment

Sports and fashion enthusiasts line up because it’s time to rise and shine with these fits from fashion week. Sports jerseys have made it to the mainstream and high-end. Paired up with an accompanying tracksuit, or a short, add to it a baseball cap, jerseys have made it far. With the talk of the town buzzing with events in sports, jerseys have earned themselves a fandom this summer as a fashion statement and staple. If the look on Billie Eilish on tour wasn’t redeeming enough for this fashion highlight, pave the way for more such examples. 

Seoul Fashion Week introduces us to Kwak Hyun Joo, a designer who blends sportswear and athleisure with ruffles and pastel trench coats. With this approach, the designer delivers an upbeat collection for the fall. With vibrant tracksuits painted in neon, the collection delivers range and youthfulness as a whole. On a similar note to styling a jersey, we have Duckdive deliver a sharp and clean look with its pairing and contrast range on the ramp. Stepping in with a black bubble skirt or cargo jeans alongside a red jersey, both of the collections prove the versatility of the garment and stretch it even further. 

Polished cargoes for stepping in breezy 

Seoul Fashion Week does not miss when it comes to functionality and style. The best example, cargo trousers. This utilitarian workwear blends in perfectly with an oversized shirt, a keyhole top or a graphic tee. The collections this season are ditching their purses with this trend as well. Witnessed in Kwak Hyun Joo’s collection, a bright purple amethyst-coloured cargo completes the look alongside a jersey. While a metallic top is paired with printed cargoes for Duckdive’s collection, Youser displays flowy silhouettes with tailored cargo on the formal and neutral end. Modern cuts and chunky arrangements are our favourite things this transitional season, the fashion week adds weight to this bias.

Cargoes, in structure, embody ease, providing a fuller, more complete look. Pair one up with a streamlined pair of shoes, an accompanying tote or sling and a pair of sunglasses, you’re good to go. Cargoes have successfully carried themselves past the summer backends because now, it’s officially the main character season for cargoes and bigger pockets. 

Denim goes grey 

Fashion weeks and grey denim have been good friends from last year's fall-winter display to date. Low-rise, high-waisted, textured, bleached, with or without patchwork, denims are done being blue. Replacing the dominant hue with a more concrete appearance.

The fashion week in Seoul nods to that and flaunts its collection in the much-favoured greys. Grey as a hue gives a more industrial, serious look to otherwise humble denim. But what it also does is it gives way to a wider palette of combinations than its bluer counterpart. Cyberpunkish essential through and through, this neutral colour pays homage to steampunk and the core characteristics associated with it. 

Ulkin’s all-denim look with grey denim skort and jacket for a statement, gives the overview into the brand’s collection and vision of the present as surrounded by droids and deep fakes, while Ajobyajo derives inspiration from Saint Maud (2019) to bring in all denim looks with a sense of secret societies and symbols. Rooting from dystopia, the other end of the spectrum of designers showcases a subtle look with neutral pigmentation as seen in Duckdive’s collection.  

Tiered Skirts and Ruffles

Call it a Boho resurgence, or call it the trend. Tiered skirts are having their season. Flawless and feminine, these cotton breathable linen skirts retain the same airy quality which breathed comfort into our Prairie dresses and dreams this summer. Characterised with tier distinction of the cloth in a flowy fabric and added ruffles to every tier termination, tiered skirts are the cornerstone establishment of every coquette-core pinboard. Low waistbands, frills, and catchy patterns breathe life into the thence bland wardrobe with a spark of childhood and liberated girlhood. 

The Fashion Week comments on the same with a collection from L 'eau Et. Laden in multiple shades of pastel and studded with intricate patterns on the frills and ruffles for a subtle, delicate appearance. The designer serves on a plate, nostalgia. Thereby paying respect to classical masterpieces, it channels inspiration from and hailing the coquette once more. The brand displayed short ruffled skirts, longer tiered ones as well as bubble skirts. While adding more texture to every piece it displayed, it forecasted the autumn renaissance for the poets and the poetic. 

Dirty martini green and purples have debuted

It is somehow that purple, periwinkle, lavender, and violet have skipped this year and made it to the next. With the fashion capital commenting and hinting towards the same, purple seems to have made its way to the ramp with designers like Kwak Hyun Joo, in chic dresses for Cahiers, and floral prints for Greedilous. Make way for the Kellyshin overcoat to convince you about the same. Iridescent purple was put to use for Re Rhee with a show-stopping dress for the opening of their collection. Nodding politely to the hue’s return to the field.

Adding to that, we have the omnipresence of green reflected in the fashion week. Dirty martini green has made itself visible in almost every collection but prominently in those presented and curated by Youser, Duckdive, Cahiers, and Greedilous. The stormy undertones of this colour bring about a fresher take and breath from the staple of browns and beiges, which in their own right are still the favourite for this season. But the palette required a revamp, and the designers got to the job. 

Lead image: Getty

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