Dilara Fındıkoğlu’s Show Was a Mass Ritual to End Toxic Masculinity
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The air hung heavy with incense at Dilara Fındıkoğlu’s Fall/Winter 2024 show, held at All Angels’ Church in London. As models walked the floor, I heard one attendee whisper to another, “Wait—they just looked into my soul.”
Models slinked down the center of the church, twisting their bodies and suggestively tapping their fingers on their hips or cheeks. They made direct eye contact with attendees, a highly unusual move at a runway show. It was almost enough to tempt my eyes away from the very good clothes, like opening model Hari Nef’s look, which involved coming-undone business attire, transparent corsetry, and latex opera gloves. Some models held bags made to look like folded newspapers with the headline, “OMG Dilara Is Doing a Satanic Orgy at a London Church.”
Backstage, Fındıkoğlu told me she viewed the show as a mass ritual to end toxic masculinity. In the show notes that sat on every guest’s seat, she wrote, “This is a manifesto for a world order born of an unrelenting vortex of femme energy, a way of being and feeling that transcends the parochial structures of conventional masculinity.” The collection, she explained, was centered around the values of “tenderness, sumptuousness, and vulnerability.” The world she is building puts divine feminine energy at the forefront.
Each of the 37 looks had a title. Nef’s was called "Female Territory." Look 3 with the newspaper clutch was "Man License." Look 32 was called "Cleopatra as a CEO," with a headpiece made of clanging vintage silver keys and a skirt modeled out of twisted corporate blazers.
Fındıkoğlu didn’t just envision the corporate world sucked into a femme vortex, but also the local pub. Look 20 was a top made out of a red and black soccer scarf. (The team being Dilara, of course.) The one that followed featured a shrunken soccer jersey with spiral cone bra detailing.
It's a trope in fashion to try to empower women by putting them in clothes made for their male peers. Fındıkoğlu, by contrast, is creating a universe where that isn’t necessary. Her women drip with sensuality without worrying about how they're perceived by the male gaze. (The sense I got is that they don't fear being perceived, period.) It’s the exact kind of world I want to live in, with the type of plucky clothing I wish I could wear everywhere.
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