Boyish Suits, Sheer Everything, and Massive Pants: 10 Trends from the Spring 2024 Men’s Collections

The big story of the spring 2024 men’s collections? The spectacle of it all. From closed down bridges (Louis Vuitton, Kenzo) to moving floors (Dior Men), and palace-side boat rides (Jacquemus) the fashion show as pageantry and display of power, wealth, and access continues to reach new heights. I saw more drones hovering over the shows than cameras taking close-ups of the clothes we were allegedly there to see. As for the brand live-streams, they’ve become increasingly good at zooming out to capture the magnitude of the scene, but lucky for you, here at Vogue Runway, our business is still very much zooming in.

The look of the season was the boyish suit, as in tailored jackets paired with tiny shorts (“Very short shorts, yes! The garçons have beautiful legs!” Hermès designer Véronique Nachinian said backstage). Classic schoolboy uniforms took over runways from Valentino and Givenchy to Ami and Paul Smith. What are all these short shorts about? Big picture: fashion is grappling with the state of masculinity. How do you dress up the modern man in a world where the archetypal man has, well, gone out of fashion? Menswear begins and ends with tailoring, and as my colleague Luke Leitch pointed out in this season’s Vogue Club recap, designers are now asking us to go back to the start. The little boy suit is playful and non-threatening; it presents a man whose masculinity is untethered to historical precedent.

A certain lightness infused the season, and it wasn’t just a response to the scorching heat. Walter Van Beirendonck and Emporio Armani offered sheer tailoring, while Saint Laurent’s Anthony Vaccarello and Dries Van Noten chose featherweight fabrics. That sense of delicacy extended to the season’s key silhouettes, which leaned flamboyant. The vests and tank tops that dominated the runways last year—and that have now taken over the streets—have been replaced by halter tops and singlets, exposing the almost-always thin bodies that wore them (but that’s a story for a different report). It remains interesting that menswear often proposes liberation by way of borrowing from queerness—singlets, halter tops, and airy, frilly fabrics are not trends for queer folk and gay men, they’re the femme items of clothing that the community first adopted to break free from norms, and now they’re liberating every other man.

At the opposite end of the spectrum are the utilitarian details found everywhere from Silvia Venturini Fendi’s factory showcase in Florence to Chitose Abe’s Carhartt partnership at Sacai. But rather than suggesting a return to tradition, these look-but-don’t-touch utility vests and tool belts propose a shelving of masculinity as we know it: The men wearing these clothes will not be spending long days at the factory, and their carpenter loops will hold no hammers.