At Balenciaga, Demna Sends a Powerful — and Deeply Personal — Message to Ukrainian Refugees

“In a time like this, fashion loses its relevance and its actual right to exist,” wrote Demna in his show notes, which were on every seat at Balenciaga’s fall ’22 show in Paris today, along with t-shirts in yellow and blue, Ukraine’s national colors. In a time like this, a fashion show couldn’t have been any more relevant. With the set resembling an Arctic tundra — models walked down the runway as fake snow and wind swept through — the event was originally conceived as a commentary on climate change. Instead, as Demna told WWD, having the models struggle against the elements was more personal. He remembered being in a shelter, “like some other 10-year-old Ukrainian boys and girls now with their parents, not knowing when the ceiling will fall on their heads.” For Demna, who recited a poem in Ukrainian during the show, the war has brought back many vivid memories of his own experiences as a Georgian refugee during his formative years. “[It] has triggered the pain of a past trauma I have carried in me since 1993, when the same thing happened in my home country and I became a forever refugee,” he wrote. “Forever, because that’s something that stays in you.

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