Across fashion’s most compelling frontiers, a new wave of women designers is shaping the conversation—challenging perceptions of femininity, refining the codes of style, and setting a sharper agenda for how we dress today.
Maria Grazia Chiuri
As the first woman to take the reins at the house of Dior, Maria Grazia Chiuri has bravely explored femininity through collections that champion the work of female artists and artisans around the world. The designer also believes that fashion can make a statement. Dior’s Fall/Winter 2025 collection, inspired by Virginia Woolf’s Orlando, “was a way to reflect on the performative dimension of gender and of fashion,” she says.
Tory Burch
“Women are defining ‘classic’ for themselves,” declared Tory Burch when she unveiled her Fall/Winter 2025 collection. The American designer knows what she’s talking about. For more than 20 years, Burch has appealed to women across different generations with designs that are refined, functional, and come with a twist—like the new “Bambi” dress covered in animal spots.
Chemena Kamali
Since taking the helm of Chloé in 2024, Chemena Kamali has unleashed a new era of romanticism upon the fashion world. Her Chloé woman is unabashedly feminine—think delicate laces and flowing dresses—but also bold enough to throw on a leather jacket. “This soft strength is really what I have always been drawn to,” says Kamali.
Nadège Vanhee
“She has everything she needs,” reads the show notes for Hermès Fall/Winter 2025 collection. Indeed, for a decade now, creative director Nadège Vanhee has made sure of that by creating the perfect wardrobe for the Hermès woman. Even before “quiet luxury” was coined, Vanhee defined it with designs that are timeless, sophisticated, practical and, in recent seasons, even sexy.
Dimitra Petsa
Greek designer Dimitra Petsa connects women’s bodies back to nature via her signature “Wetlook” dresses, which are intricately hand sewn and draped to resemble water ripples. “The Wetlook is a symbol of self-acceptance and honouring our fluid state, embracing the natural self, the fact that we come from water, we are wet,” she says.
Miuccia Prada
For almost 50 years, Miuccia Prada has expressed the complexities and contradictions of being a woman through her fashion brands Prada and Miu Miu. At the latter, the intellectual designer follows her instinct—and where Prada goes, the rest of the world has followed.
Sarah Burton
“I want to address everything about modern women. Strength, vulnerability, emotional intelligence, feeling powerful or very sexy. All of it,” said Sarah Burton about her new chapter as the creative director of Givenchy. Burton’s all-encompassing vision, as seen in her debut collection for the French couture house, includes cocooning jackets, minidresses with capes, and backwards blazers that show off her signature sharp tailoring.
Adeline Ester
For Indonesian fashion designer Adeline Ester, a dress is a “canvas for self-expression and empowerment”, she writes. This is none more evident than at Ester’s eponymous haute couture brand, where she blurs the line between art and fashion with gowns featuring surreal silhouettes and elaborate craftsmanship.
Silvia Venturini Fendi
Out of the 100 years that Fendi has been around, Silvia Venturini Fendi has spent more than 30 of them shaping the Italian fashion house as artistic director of accessories, menswear and occasionally womenswear. The designer honours her family business’s origins as a leather and fur workshop with styles that are sleek, sensual and above all, modern. “Fendi reminds me of the future,” she says.
This story first appeared in the September 2025 issue of GRAZIA Singapore.
PHOTOGRAPHY JOEL LOW
CREATIVE DIRECTION AND STYLING KELLY HSU
WORDS PAMEYLA CAMBE
HAIR AND MAKEUP RICK YANG/ ARTISTRY STUDIOS USING CHANEL BEAUTY AND REVLON PROFESSIONAL
MODEL MAIA BOSCH/ NOW MODEL MANAGEMENT
PHOTOGRAPHY ASSISTANT EDDIE TEO
FASHION ASSISTANT MITCHELL HOO
HAIR AND MAKEUP ASSISTANT CADIX YANG
READ MORE
Focus Mode: The bags that help you slow down or power through
Get ready with Mavis Siow: The content creator shares all her style secrets