It may be 2025, but after looking at the couture fashion week runways and street style this week, you could be forgiven for thinking that we're living some time in the 1800s.
Corsets flooded the haute couture catwalk, from Schiaparelli – where Kendall Jenner wore a sculpted column dress – to historic Italian label Giorgio Armani Privé, where models walked in svelte glittery gowns. On the streets, influencers and high-profile clients arriving at the Dior Haute Couture show flaunted their figures while wearing fashion girdles from the French designer house's recent collections.
Women have long held a love-hate relationship with the corset. Few fashion items are as bound in controversy as this tight-laced, boned cage popularised in the Victorian era designed to slim the waist and shape the female figure. In recent years, fashion has seemed to welcome this sartorial torture device back with open arms. From red carpet appearances (hi Zendaya in Jean Paul Gaultier) to runway shows to TikTok, for better or worse, corsets refuse to be a thing of the past. But for everyone who celebrates the act of taking back this repressive item and turning it into a tool for female empowerment, there those not quite convinced that we've completely shrugged off its more sinister connotations.
As Kylie Jenner stepped onto the runway yesterday in Ludovic de Saint Sernin's guest collection for Jean Paul Gaultier wearing a nipped, serpentine number, the image immediately went viral. She looked amazing, of course, the perfectly tailored copper satin dress skimming her body in all the right places, the corseted bodice whittling her waist, hugging her ribs and highlighting her breasts. Inevitably, the dialogue online immediately became centred around her body, with some critics calling the look “supervulgar” and tabloids speculating about “yet another” boob job. I'm sure Kylie and the rest of her family could tell you that commenting on their bodies is sadly not new, but it seems every time a woman wears a corset, it becomes an invitation to judge her physique—positively or otherwise.
For one of the most famous examples in recent history, I'd like to direct your attention to Billie Eilish's infamous Vogue June 2021 cover where she dons a custom corseted dress by Vivienne Westwood, setting off weeks of heated discourse about body image.
But the problem with seeing corsets take over the most rarified spaces in fashion like the haute couture runways is the message it sends: If those at the pinnacle of fashion as an art form continue to celebrate the corset and the shape it gives a woman, what does it say about beauty, power, wealth and those who deserve it?
The way corsets are popularised today seems to beg more questions than it answers. Doing away with the restrictive brace over the centuries was meant to be an act of physical and symbolic liberation. Beyond physical harm (it was known to cause organs to shift, restrict blood flow, and even sometimes fatally impale women), the corset has long been seen to sustain a tired stereotype of what a woman's body “should” look like—full breasts, a nipped waist and voluptuous hips, an archaic notion that this hourglass figure is what would attract a male suitor, even at the steep cost of the woman's wellbeing. So if a woman chooses to wear one today, does it automatically make it empowering? If we really like the way we look in this at-best uncomfortable, at-worse dangerous accessory, is it because we think we look more beautiful?
In the 1980s, designers like Vivienne Westwood, Martin Margiela and Jean Paul Gaultier (remember Madonna's iconic cone bra?) began bringing them back in a ironic way, putting a subversive twist on the undergarment, the corset returned to the fashion lexicon as the way pedal pushers or culottes have. But their prevalence today feels a little less innocent than the three-quarter-length shorts. Last year, searches for corsets were up 27% month on month on resale sites like Depop, as Gen Z have become enamoured with its sculpting shape, often seen pairing the top with super-low-rise jeans a la Nicola Peltz-Beckham. Young women often follow these style icons' cue, but are there potential health concerns we're ignoring, both physical and psychological, for growing teens wearing the restrictive garment as a fashion statement?
“I realised when you wear the corset, you just don’t eat,” actress Simone Ashley told GLAMOUR about her experience filming Bridgerton. "It changes your body. I had a lot of pain with the corset, too, I think I tore my shoulder at one point!”
The body-restricting garment may be no more.
The question of a corset's connotations has divided our office and many in the fashion community I've spoken to this week. Some argue yes. The corset top today, made in more generous fabrics and sizes, serves more as a glorified belt than anything. And the women's liberation movement gave us the hard-won right to wear whatever we want, even if it does cut off our oxygen supply.
“I’m not entirely against the corset trend,” says Sophie Donovan, GLAMOUR's Senior Commerce Writer. “There is a certain sense of confidence that comes with wearing something that accentuates my curves, rather than totally disguising them.”
It's true that designs today are less asphyxiating and more aimed at encouraging women to embrace their femininity, but as we head into the weeks preceding Valentine's Day and lingerie brands are dropping their latest releases, the corset seems to be paving the way for a troubling trend. “I’ve been tasked with curating GLAMOUR’s edit of the best Valentine’s Day gifts for her and him this year, and it has confirmed a sad suspicion: that it's still suggested we look our best (read: sexiest) when sculpted and cinched,” adds Sophie. "From my personal experience, it takes a certain level of confidence to reveal yourself to your partner in nothing more than a bra and matching knickers — but now I’m questioning whether the designers believe my not-so wash-board abs should be hidden beneath an embroidered truss?”
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