If redemption had a runway, John Galliano walked it in broken mirrors and Margiela - part cabaret, part couture, all glorious comeback
If redemption had a runway, John Galliano walked it in broken mirrors and Margiela - part cabaret, part couture, all glorious comeback
December 1, 2025
If redemption had a runway, John Galliano walked it in broken mirrors and Margiela - part cabaret, part couture, all glorious comeback
The fashion world loves a phoenix story, but none quite matches the theatrical resurrection of John Galliano. From the dizzying heights of Dior to the depths of disgrace, and then improbably, magnificently to the avant-garde halls of Maison Margiela, where he would spend a transformative decade redefining both himself and the house that gave him sanctuary.
In 2011, fashion's most flamboyant showman found himself exiled from his kingdom. After fifteen years of conjuring dreams at Dior, Galliano's career imploded in spectacular fashion. “The scandal destroyed his career and reputation,” - Anna Wintou said. In the ensuing silence, Galliano confronted himself. He later admitted: “John, you really messed up. You’ve let down a lot of people.” He apologized publicly for the hurt caused, stating those views did not reflect his beliefs. He entered rehab and committed to recovery, hoping to rebuild his life.The apology was public, private rehabilitation, and the fashion world watched with a mixture of disappointment and curiosity as one of its brightest stars dimmed to near darkness.
But fashion, like nature, abhors a vacuum, especially one shaped like John Galliano. The industry that had swiftly condemned him couldn't quite forget the genius that had once transformed runways into theatrical wonderlands. Enter Anna Wintour, fashion's most powerful kingmaker, who orchestrated a quiet residency at Oscar de la Renta in 2013. It was there, working alongside Oscar himself on the Fall collection, that Galliano began to sketch the outline of his redemption. Brief though it was, this interlude reminded everyone of an inconvenient truth: talent of this magnitude doesn't simply disappear.
To understand the alchemy of John Galliano’s decade at Maison Margiela, one must first appreciate the profound improbability of the pairing. It was, on paper, the fashion equivalent of arranging a marriage between a silent, reclusive monk and a flamboyant, theatre-loving diva. Martin Margiela, the house’s enigmatic founder and "fashion’s invisible man," had built a brand on anonymity, deconstruction, and intellectual minimalism—a house that whispered. John Galliano, by contrast, was the consummate showman, a designer for whom every collection was a sweeping historical epic and every exit a theatrical bow.
Then came October 2014, and with it an announcement that made the fashion world collectively raise its perfectly groomed eyebrows: John Galliano would become Creative Director at Maison Margiela. It was like announcing that Liberace would be conducting the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra.
Yet, the partnership was blessed at its inception. The two visionaries met for tea - a meeting that would prove pivotal. Rather than resistance, Margiela offered his successor permission and a mandate: "Take what you will from the DNA of the house, protect yourself and make it your own." With those words, one of fashion's most improbable partnerships was not only formed but sanctified.
Galliano's debut in 2015 didn't just merge two aesthetics; it created an entirely new language. The first Artisanal collection introduced concepts that would become signatures: "décortiqué" (stripping away outer layers), "dressing in haste" (the unconscious glamour of rushed morning routines), and later, his masterpiece portmanteau, "artisanalogy." The bride who closed that first show wore red: a declaration that this would not be business as usual.
What followed was a masterclass in creative evolution. The Fall-Winter 2015 ready-to-wear collection gave birth to the Margiela girl Galliano envisioned: caught in life's beautiful chaos, throwing on whatever was at hand: a T-shirt here, kitchen gloves there - yet somehow achieving that elusive unconscious glamour. This was behavioral anthropology translated into tulle and taffeta.
By 2016, Galliano was ready to push boundaries further. His collaboration with artist Benjamin Shine for the Artisanal collection produced those haunting, smoke-like faces that seemed to emerge from the fabric itself - achieved not through sewing but through an intricate process of pleating and ironing. When the collection went viral (a phrase that actually meant something in 2016), it marked Margiela's emergence from fashion insider secret to global phenomenon. The coats that bore these ethereal visages were wearable hallucinations.
Spring-Summer 2018 saw Galliano playing with perception itself, reproducing the high shine of plastic raincoats through prints, creating garments that shapeshifted under different lights. The collaboration with Reebok for those memorable "monster trainers" proved that high fashion and streetwear could speak the same language when Galliano was translating.
The Autumn-Winter 2018 Artisanal collection introduced the concept of "nomadic cutting," showcasing clothing as a form of metamorphosis that rejected singular definitions. Garments migrated across the body, exemplified by a skirt revealing a jacket's form within its structure and a bustier transforming into a cape. This highly unstructured and avant-garde approach demanded both surgical precision and surrealist imagination in its creation. Models wore masks and helmets, intentionally deemphasizing individual identity to focus the viewer's attention entirely on the radical, transforming nature of the outfits themselves.
The 2020 collections introduced "Recicla", Galliano's take on upcycling that transformed charity shop finds into haute couture. Each piece came labeled with its provenance, the year it was found, its journey from forgotten to fabulous. This was not just sustainability; it was storytelling through salvage. Here was a way to produce meaningful fashion that carried narrative weight along with its price tag.
“It’s a return to…slower fashion that we believe in. It’s buying invention with a conscience,” Galliano explains.
That same year, the "Replica" concept evolved further, with the team masterfully recreating their replica pieces so perfectly that the originals and reproductions became indistinguishable. It was a philosophical meditation on authenticity disguised as a collection, very Margiela, very Galliano.
Ivy Getty's 2021 wedding became an unexpected stage for John Galliano, who designed custom gowns, most notably the bridal dress. The dress's striking feature was a sophisticated disco ball effect, achieved by meticulously reassembling broken mirrors like stained glass. Though traditionally a wedding taboo signaling bad luck, the couple embraced the broken mirror motif as a symbol of facing and cherishing conflict as an opportunity for deeper understanding and lasting happiness. This same broken-shard inspiration carried over to Ivy's crown, which took 80 hours to create, directly referencing a key motif from Maison Margiela's Fall-Winter 2015 Artisanal collection.
The "Anonymity of a lining" collection that same year turned fashion inside out. Those hidden beautiful things, the careful stitches and tailor marks usually concealed, became the stars. It was deconstruction with purpose, revealing the craftsmanship that luxury fashion often hides beneath its glamorous surface.
And then came 2024 - the year Galliano would create what many consider his masterpiece and his farewell. Staged under the Pont Alexandre III, the Artisanal SS24 show, dubbed ‘Artisanalogy’, was not just a collection; it was a cultural event. It was the full, unfiltered synthesis of Galliano and Margiela - a haunting, beautiful, and viral spectacle.
Drawing from 1930s cabaret and the ghostly allure of a forgotten Parisian nightclub, models emerged like revenants from the shadows. The setting was a character in itself. “I discovered the bridge on one of my morning jogs,” Galliano recounted. “I loved the address, the idea of inviting guests there and then taking them below, into the underbelly, with the river’s ebb and flow, the muffled sound of cars above. It became the soundtrack for my characters.”
The clothes were a masterwork of technique and storytelling: corseted gowns, sculptural suits, and intricate lace bodices whispering of glamour and decay. But the true alchemy was on the skin. Makeup artist Pat McGrath took Galliano’s brief for “glass skin” and created something entirely new. “He said, I’d love to take it to glass skin. Instantly, I knew we had to find something completely new,” McGrath said. The ethereal, porcelain finish took over 30 minutes per model but requiring seven layers initially, eventually streamlined to a mere thirty minutes of application. Days, weeks, months later, people were still talking about it.
The world became obsessed. The show went viral within hours. "No, I've never experienced a show that goes viral. That's the first time, I think," Galliano admitted with characteristic understatement. The collection sparked a global conversation about beauty, transformation, and the power of fashion to transport us to other worlds. Gwendoline Christie, who walked in the show after years of admiring Galliano from afar, captured the zeitgeist: "It's influenced me more greatly than I can even convey. Wild imagination but coupled with real craftsmanship - those things coming together and creating true artistry."
But for Galliano, the greatest reward was seeing inspiration take root in a new generation. “The kids were dressing up with pillows and dad’s coats, doing the Léon walk,” he noted with delight. “To go home and see a kid turn his raincoat backward and charge down the street—that makes me happy.”
The Meta Gala appearance of Zendaya in custom Margiela that same year—where she opened in Galliano's Margiela and closed in his vintage Givenchy, felt like a victory lap. "That kind of blew me away," Galliano confessed. The dresses, with their Penn-worthy sculptural quality, proved that his vision could translate from runway to red carpet without losing an ounce of magic.
"The challenge we set ourselves—the results of it have been to build up on the DNA Martin [Margiela] left at the house. It's really the blood that courses through our creative veins and a possible blueprint," Galliano reflected as his tenure drew to a close. Over a decade, he had created not just collections but a new vocabulary for fashion. Terms like "artisanalogy" entered the lexicon. Techniques like retrograding—treating the wearer like a line drawing that gains dimension through fabric and color—pushed the boundaries of what fashion could be.
John Galliano left Maison Margiela at his creative peak, proud and hopeful. He didn't just rehabilitate his career; he revolutionized a house that many thought was too intellectual, too niche for the mainstream. Under his tenure, Margiela became a stage for storytelling, emotion, and reinvention. The invisible house became unmissably visible, yet somehow retained its mystery.
The fashion world still buzzes with speculation: Will Galliano remain in the Margiela universe somehow, or will he, as whispers suggest, one day return to Dior? Whatever comes next, his decade at Margiela stands as proof that second acts in fashion aren't just possible; sometimes they're even more magnificent than the first.
As Galliano himself noted, watching kids turn their raincoats backward and charge down the street in imitation of his models: "That's how shows used to be, no? You'd leave inspired to recreate it yourself with whatever you had. That's good enough." More than good enough, it's fashion at its most democratic, most joyful, most transformative.
The king had his comeback. Long may his influence reign.
