“Boys wanna be her, girls wanna be her...” was the refrain that echoed through the room as Nicolas Ghesquière opened Louis Vuitton’s Cruise 2027 show in New York City with all the swagger of a cult sci-fi heroine entering frame. To the thumping tune of Peaches' 2006 electroclash track Boys Wanna Be Her, models moved through moss-carpeted corridors and around interior fountains in sculpted leather, sharp tailoring and exaggerated silhouettes that seemed to belong simultaneously to the 1960s, the 1980s and some imagined future.
Ghesquière has long mastered the art of collapsing time periods into a nebulous sartorial vision, but Cruise 2027 felt especially confident in its contradictions. Hosted at The Frick – a space where art from the Renaissance to the late nineteenth century are displayed in one of New York City's last great Gilded Age mansions – the collection ricocheted between decades without ever becoming costume. There were unmistakable nods to the 1960s throughout: warm palettes dominated by oranges and blues, pillbox hats, tan leather blazers and mini skirts galore. But just as quickly, those references collided with pointed 1980s power shoulders, bubble-shouldered dresses and military-style jackets that marched through the space with deliberate force.
"Hosted at The Frick – a space where art from the Renaissance to the late nineteenth century are displayed in one of New York City's last great Gilded Age mansions – the collection ricocheted between decades without ever becoming costume."
Elsewhere, the collection veered into a kind of downtown futurism (a nod perhaps to their locus in NYC). Those wiry chokers of our youth, and mesh shirts pulled from the visual language of the 1990s, made an appearance, while Western-style collars and ponchos introduced an Americana eccentricity that somehow made perfect sense within Vuitton’s universe. Models appeared with blue-and-pink striped halo hair that felt cuttingly like a nod to Alysa Liu – newly announced House ambassador watching from the front row (alongside Zendaya, Anne Hathaway, Emma Stone no less).
In terms of materiality, leather dominated nearly everything, often stiffened into sculptural forms. Even the bags resisted softness. This was not a season interested in slouch. New boxy handbag silhouettes appeared outlined as though sketched by hand, while pillbox bags and vinyl-record-inspired accessories introduced a playful graphic sharpness. Sneakers paired with blazers and dresses stopped the collection from collapsing beneath the weight of its references, grounding the styling in the reality of how women actually move now.
The show’s collaboration with Keith Haring delivered some of its loudest and most playful moments. Haring’s iconic figurines appeared across tops and bags, metallic cut-out earrings caught the shifting light, and a bib-front “New York” shirt leaned knowingly into the city hosting the show. Importantly, this was not Haring’s first dialogue with the House. In the lead-up to Cruise 2027, Louis Vuitton shared on Instagram an archival image of the artist’s now-famous 1930s Louis Vuitton leather suitcase covered in his marker drawings from 1984 – a subtle teaser that connected the collaboration back to the House’s own history.
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Beneath washes of royal blue, forest green and burning sunset-red light, the soundtrack shifted into Daniel Pemberton’s sweeping orchestral Box in a Box from the blockbuster sci-fi film Project Hail Mary, pushing the collection fully into cinematic fantasy. By the final looks, the collection became increasingly noisy in the best possible way. Metallic boxy skirts collided with frilled diaphanous tops, textures clashed, layers exaggerated and proportions expanded into something almost chaotic. Yet Ghesquière never lost control of the narrative. Cruise 2027 ultimately forced worlds to collide – retro, futuristic, downtown, polished, loud. Somehow, against all logic, it worked.
