In a moment where fashion shows have turned into splashy spectacles meant to be captured from every angle on myriad devices and evaluated by their resonance in the digital ether, Yohji Yamamoto wanted a more intimate experience.

Not through a FOMO-inducing reduction in seating, mind you.

A note left on each chair at his spring show enjoined guests to use their eyes rather than their phones.

“Let the moment, the movement and the clothing speak to you – they are meant to be felt with your senses, not merely digitally recorded,” it added. 

You certainly needed to have your eyes peeled to take in the details – and your wits about you to trace filiations in the subtle turn of a shoulder, the structure of a jacket with delicate fraying panels or an asymmetrical neckline delicately revealing the collarbone.

The clothes spoke of a lifetime’s journey through influences from Western tailoring and historical garments to Japanese calligraphy and the black-white-red palette that infuses in Japan’s art, textiles and beauty.

Whisper-thin wools were turned into asymmetric column dresses that left one shoulder bare. Filmy chiffon fluttered as handkerchief hems and clingy jersey came knotted and braided into supple panels that hugged rib cages or curved on a hip.

Printed on the simplest of tunic dresses was an invitation to Giorgio Armani’s spring 2026 show, intended as a celebration of his 50-year career before his death on Sept. 3. On the back were images from the late designer’s campaigns.

Backstage after the show, Yamamoto pulled out the original invitation letter, carefully folded in its envelope, and talked about meeting the late Italian designer attending the opening of the first Emporio Armani store in Paris. “He looked so happy that I visited,” he said. “From that moment, we became friends.”

Yamamoto has always stood apart by his fashions, but he has a keen eye on – and friendly rapport with – those of his peers with whom he shares a passion for form, fit and fabrication. Technical mastery, too, given how deceptively effortless draped dresses appeared, only for the flash of a seam to reveal cunning constructions.

It brought to mind another thought.

As expectant crowds look to debuts for new silhouettes, Yamamoto’s spring collection spoke about one constant: how those who dress our impermanent shapes in beauty earn an immortal place in fashion’s history.