SUB-BS23

The scenography of Balenciaga's Summer 2023 show was designed by sub in collaboration with Spanish artist Santiago Sierra. The show held during Paris Fashion Week at the Parc des Expositions de Villepinte, featured a runway carved through mounds of mud from a peat bog. The convention center was filled with 275 cubic meters of mud, creating a large pit with layers of boggy earth piled in mounds and troughs across the floor. At the Balenciaga show, a path was channeled into the mud-caked floor around a sunken pit, forming a runway for models to trek through in the Spring Summer 2023 collection. Models left footprints in the mud as they walked, with mud splashing onto their skin and luxury clothing. A custom-made scent by Norwegian scent researcher and artist Sissel Tolaas was pumped into the space, reportedly smelling like the "raw odor of decomposition". After the show, the peat bog mud would be collected by horticultural company Florentaise and reused in landscaping and horticultural projects.