Fashion
The New Designer Getting Gen Z Excited About the ‘80s
“You’re going to like this one,” a friend told me back in February as I sat in a room filled with chairs arranged in circles, surrounding circular sheepskin rugs. Soon models would appear in front of us, staking their heels in the fluffy fabric, wearing oil slick black bubble dresses and smoked drop waist skirts and emoting wildly, as if they were in a ‘80s dance video. It was only Nicklas Skovgaard’s second time presenting at Copenhagen Fashion Week and still there was plenty of fanfare. The Danish brand, while only four years old, has the kind of hype some designers spend decades chasing.
This season, Skovgaard opted for a presentation and the excitement hadn’t died down. In the days (and even weeks) leading up to it, every fashion editor I knew who was heading to the Danish capital spoke of it as the one thing they wouldn’t dare miss. Held in a gallery, the crowd spilled onto the streets, as models walked in front of a camcorder set-up inside, wearing his signature bubble silhouette and textured jackets with large shoulders. Projected on the wall were snippets of aerobics videos that his mother starred in decades ago.
After the show, Skovgaard told me, “Since I was a child, I used to watch my mother getting dressed. And I would think, How would I actually dress myself if I was a woman? What clothes would I put on? And what shoes would I wear with that skirt and what top would I wear with that necklace? Those what ifs are the keystone of the pieces I do.” His eponymous brand, he went on to say, “Is really just an expression of all the things I like…and right now, I am obsessed with this ‘80s world of Madonna.” But the reason he is obsessed with the era isn’t because of the Material Girl herself but because of his own mother.
Nicklas Skovgaard SS25.
“This season was inspired by my mother in the late ‘80s—she was 30 at that time. And in less than a month, I will be 30 myself,” he said. “I thought there was something interesting about looking at these old images of her from that time of her life, when she was about to give birth to me. She’s either dressed very formally in an oversized power suit, or she’s wearing these very sporty looks, like a pair of leggings with a t-shirt and a big headband.” She had moved to London briefly at a young age to train as an aerobic instructor, hence the videos that played during the presentation. What Skovgaard was really drawn to was the contrast between the different kinds of looks she would wear, sporty one second and elevated the next. “And so I thought we should do a swimsuit that you could wear with your big jacket and put on a pair of dancing tights…or layer your bikini with a big skirt.”
Nicklas Skovgaard SS25.
Some looks that invited enthusiastic pats on the shoulder and nods of admiration were a lace white dress with a smocked wide band waist, worn with footless leggings and shimmering black pumps, a tunic constructed like a pink homecoming dance dress that draped over a long black skirt, and an off-the shoulder gray sweatsuit leotard, of course worn with lace stockings and leg-warmers. Models approached guests like myself, sometimes not entirely ready, asking for help zipping into their dresses. They kissed one another on the cheek before spinning out onto the street and shaking their hips with joie de vivre.
Nicklas Skovgaard SS25.
“At least for my brand, it fits way better that we have this interaction with the audience coming to the show, and that you really feel the vibe of that cast and the vibe of that certain woman walking in that certain dress,” Skovgaard said of his decision to present in this way. And while ‘80s aerobic videos are choreographed, he asked his cast to move however they would like. “We put on clothes because we go about our everyday life. It’s also nice to see, even though it might be a little bit exaggerated in the shows or the presentations, to really see the movement and let the clothes come alive together with the person wearing it.”
And while they absolutely did come alive inside the white-walled gallery, it was easy to see how his vision was alive and well with the audience, whose eyes lit up with every passing twirl and strut. When I looked around the room, I heard editors mumble off which looks they want for themselves (and could possibly buy on Ssense, where the brand has been carrying a handful of exclusive for the retailer pieces), not just which ones they would write about.
Nicklas Skovgaard SS25.
“What I love about fashion myself is that fashion can affect your state of mind. You start thinking what stories will I tell or what life will I be living if I was wearing this dress? Or what music would I be listening to if I was wearing this dress? Or how would I be feeling?” he said. Everyone in attendance was currently scanning each look thinking the same questions to themselves before stating, “I think I want that.”
The hold that Y2K has on younger fashion fans feels never-ending, but Skovgaard has proven capable of interesting them in another era entirely.
Tara Gonzalez is the Senior Fashion Editor at Harper’s Bazaar. Previously, she was the style writer at InStyle, founding commerce editor at Glamour, and fashion editor at Coveteur.
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