At Denim Première Vision in Milan last week, denim consultant Amy Leverton of Denim Dudes declared that fashion is pivoting toward a new era of "loud luxury," led by Gucci's controversial creative director, Demna. For The Lingerie Museum, this shift is particularly fascinating because it resurrects an overt sexuality that lingerie has long championed - from the corset to the garter belt - now writ large in denim and accessories.
Demna's revival of the exposed Gucci double-G thong is a direct callback to the house's Tom Ford era (1994-2004), when the designer famously used lingerie as a tool of provocation, sending models down the runway in barely-there lace and satin. Today, Demna pairs that same unapologetic skin-baring with denim's gritty texture, creating a tension that Leverton describes as a remedy for "good taste fatigue." The thong, once a secret beneath clothing, becomes a visible emblem of status and rebellion.
This trend echoes the Y2K "footballer style" epitomized by David and Victoria Beckham, where low-rise jeans and visible waistbands signaled both wealth and sexual confidence. Brands like Diesel, Dsquared2, and Jaded London have adopted this formula, but Demna's approach is more abrasive. He layers resin-coated denim, logo jacquard, and subversive skinny fits - skin-tight café racer jackets and jeggings that hug the body like a second skin. The result is a silhouette that demands attention, much like the structured girdles and bullet bras of mid-century lingerie.
Leverton notes that Demna's runway is filled with "perfect bodies," a choice that has drawn criticism for its lack of inclusivity. Yet she wonders if this is a deliberate mirror held up to the era's obsession with GLP-1 drugs and cosmetic enhancement. "He shows us the ugly as well as the beautiful," she says. For curators of intimate apparel, this tension between exposure and concealment, desire and critique, is the very fabric of lingerie's history. As Demna pushes denim into the realm of the erotic, he reminds us that the body - clothed or nearly bare - remains fashion's most potent canvas.
Originally reported by WWD