Fresh off the Press: Read the Latest
The latest from The Citizen’s Poste spans longform features, interviews, and cultural commentary examining fashion and culture as systems: how they’re built, how they operate, and how they shape the present moment. We publish with intention, not urgency. That means fewer pieces, sharper thinking, and writing that assumes an intelligent reader. No trend-chasing, no filler. Start wherever you like. Stay as long as you want. This is fashion and culture for readers who prefer substance, clarity, and a little wit with their rigor.
For Her, By Him: When Fashion’s Feminine Ideal Is Man-Made
In the mythology of fashion, few things are more revered than the man who “understands women.” He’s not only dressing the female figure, he shapes, sculpts, and celebrates it. He just seems to get women. Or so the narrative goes. From Valentino Garavani’s timeless allure to Gianni Versace’s bold sensuality the legacy of menswear-designed womenswear has long been romanticized as a form of benevolent mastery. But in a moment when fashion is reckoning with gendered gaze and a grappling of power, it’s worth asking: who does this understanding really serve?
Martens at Margiela: Masked, Molten, and Metamorphic
Glenn Martens’ much-anticipated debut for Maison Margiela Haute Couture landed not with a whisper but with a plastic-cloaked cry. In a fashion week dominated by embellishment and classical beauty, Martens proposed something far more provocative—a vision of couture submerged in synthetic suffocation and the debris of modern life.
Zuhair Murad’s Girls Of The Golden Age
Zuhair Murad’s Fall/Winter 2025 couture collection doesn’t just pay homage to Old Hollywood: it unveils it, reframes it, and hands the star a new ending. Shown Yesterday in Paris, the show was a polished fantasy with sharp undertones. Strong silhouettes accompanied by satin and sequins, alluded to the traditional, reclaiming decades of the past, rather than mourning nostalgia.
Inside Chanel’s Fall/Winter 2025/26 Haute Couture Salon
The show opened not with drama, but with restraint. Presented in the newly restored Salon d’Honneur at the Grand Palais, the collection leaned into intimacy, as well as tradition This wasn’t a headline-hunting spectacle, but rather a quiet assertion of couture’s enduring values: silhouette, texture, and craft.
The Untold Stories of Ashi Studio
Every show begins with a feeling, this one began with dissonance. A melancholic dress moved slowly in tune with the echoing violin’s lingering notes. Silk, lace, rhinestones — recurring, shimmering anew. Your eyes flicker from one detail to another: animal motifs seem to breathe, blooming patterns that stir like gentle sighs, modern silhouettes woven into timeless shapes.
Armani Goes Dark: Seduction in Black
This collection managed to do so much with so little color, reinforcing the “Seductive Black” theme. Greyscale from head to toe, from black berets, to grey eye shadow, to dramatically black looks, the shimmering materials and striking silhouettes really had their time to shine. Striking, angular beauty, reminiscent of old Hollywood glamour through gelled back hair, drop earrings, and gowns dripping in sequins and feathers give a unique interpretation that reimagined an iconic fashion era.
Rebellion Against Disorder: Georges Hobeika at Couture FW 2025-26
In a world delicately poised between algorithmic hysteria and existential drift, Georges Hobeika proposes an unlikely antidote: The New Order— a lyrically crafted tension between self-doubt and determination, between the boundaries that surround us and our quiet refusal to remain contained.
A Bend in Time: Schiaparelli Opens Haute Couture Week in Surreal Style
After the slow drift of a 4th of July weekend, what better way to jolt back into reality than the start of Haute Couture Week? Some might have preferred to sleep in, but it's not every day Schiaparelli opens the week with a new couture collection. Plus, Schiaparelli always feels more like a dream than a runway show anyway, so what's the difference, really?
The Illusion of Freedom: Why Menswear Still Plays by the Rules
The dance between freedom and control in fashion is ongoing — and it’s far from equal. Menswear can flirt with softness or absurdity, but it is still expected to remain legible, anchored in some version of seriousness. Womenswear can slip into spectacle, but that spectacle often becomes an obligation, a demand to stay endlessly interesting. Fashion keeps circling this question, never quite answering it. Are these boundaries finally breaking, or just learning to hide behind prettier fabrics?
Crafting Femininity: Dior, Gender, and the Future of Fashion
Historically, most creative directors and designers for womenswear have been male. Women have consistently excelled in both of these roles, Like Vera Wang and Vivianne Westwood, yet still seem to be undervalued in a profession where their own gender is the target market. The gender of the designer plays a significant role in shaping the design itself, and the value in designing according to lived gendered experiences is not to be overlooked.
The Male Gaze in Stitching
When Anderson picks up the thread and needle at Dior, he inherits more than just a brand. He stitches into a gaze. After all, fashion is more than just fabric. It’s power, storytelling, and a question of who gets to hold the needle.
The Wrong Shoe Always Fits (Even When It Doesn’t)
There’s something quietly reassuring about contradiction. The way opposites cling to each other, not despite their difference, but because of it… Chaos? Not quite. Disruption. Contradiction. Curiosity. It’s a tension fashion knows intimately, especially when it comes to what we wear on our feet.
Scarves, Sisterhood, and Style: Inside DAïA’s World
Some pieces aren’t just worn— they’re inherited. They live in drawers, on hooks, passed between hands and across generations, gathering memory with every fold. DAÏA, a brand built on scarves and storytelling, doesn’t chase trends or seasons. Instead, it centers heritage: personal, cultural, and communal. Founded by Yelissah Gabala, DAÏA reclaims the scarf as both adornment and archive: a way to express identity, honor lineage, and offer beauty that endures.
Sensory Seduction: Textural Marketing and the Blurred Lines Between Beauty, Food, and Fashion
There’s a reason you want to lick the lip gloss. Or press your thumb into the pleated folds of that lemon-yellow handbag. Or reach through your screen and pull the martini olive-shaped earring straight from the model’s ear. Lately, it feels like everything looks good enough to eat, and that’s exactly the point.
Birkinomics: How a Battered Bag Became a Status Symbol
With the original Birkin Bag, a prototype made specially for the late ‘70s-it-girl’ Jane Birkin, set to be auctioned off this July in Paris, discussions around the infamous Hermès handbag have resurrected. Let's start from the beginning, circa 1984. French film icon, Ms. Birkin herself, was aboard a flight from London to Paris when her distressed basket (her signature ‘shabby-chic’ bag) started to break, spilling its contents out in Air France’s first class area. Birkin’s wallet, keys, cigarettes, glasses, diapers, and business cards were scattered all over, catching the attention of the passenger seated next to her, the then executive of Hermès, Jean-Louis Dumas.
All eyes on Monaco: Where Quiet Luxury, Motorsport, and Cultural Capital Collide
More than just a race, Monaco is where legacy meets luxury. Crown jewel of Formula 1, the Grand Prix transforms the principality into an exhilarating mix of fashion, status, and spectacle for one unique weekend every year. From old money aesthetic to business opportunities, fashion has played a key role in Formula 1 over the past decades – and the biggest luxury and fashion brands are now scrambling to get themselves into the F1 paddock.
Gaurav Gupta’s Living Sculptures Emulate Fashion as Architecture
We recognize Gaurav Gupta for dressing the likes of Beyoncé, Cardi B, and Alia Bhatt in his neon yellow sarees, redefining Indian traditional dress, and Mugler-esque metal torso gowns that sculpt the body like armor. But Gupta is far more than a designer for celebrities; he is a visionary who approaches fashion as a sculptural form, blending tailored precision with fluid movement.
When Elegance Becomes a Cage: Why Cannes’ Ban on Nude Dressing Hurts More Than It Helps (If It Helps at All)
“Nude dressing” isn’t a scandal of modern vanity. It’s one of fashion’s oldest legacies. In ancient Greece, women wore translucent robes that flowed and clung to the body. In revolutionary France, sheer muslin gowns became symbols of liberation from corsets and control. In the 1920s, flappers danced in backless dresses. In the 1960s, miniskirts were weapons of protest. In the ’90s, Kate Moss wore a see-through slip—not to provoke, but simply because it was what she wanted.
Power, Performance, and the Office Siren Fantasy
There’s something undeniably alluring about the “office siren” aesthetic. The sharp lines of a tailored pencil skirt, the satisfying click of a sleek stiletto on tile, the quiet sheen of a neutral silk blouse unbuttoned just so. It’s eye catching. It’s powerful. It’s cinematic. It’s also maybe not the feminist serve we think it is. As an aesthetic that blends elton’s of fantasy with practicality in a uniquely internet friendly way, the “office siren” has lingered since it’s inception.
Tailored Legacies: Dandyism Reimagined at the 2025 Met Gala
The first Monday in May, also known as Met Monday, marked yet another iconic evening as celebrities, musicians, athletes, and fashion icons gathered on the steps of The Metropolitan Museum of Art. This year's Met Gala held particular significance, not only for its usual fundraising for the Costume Institute but also for the powerful theme of "Superfine: Tailoring Black Style." The exhibition explored the important role of clothing in shaping Black identities within the Atlantic diaspora, inspired by Monica L. Miller's book Slaves to Fashion: Black Dandyism and the Styling of Black Diasporic Identity.