In a Vintage Mugler “Gynoid” Suit, Zendaya Is In a Fashion Galaxy of Her Own

I tip my space helmet to Zendaya, who took one bionic step onto the red carpet at Dune: Part Two’s premiere this evening, and made everyone else in Leicester Square redundant in the eyes of the world’s fashion press.

Earlier today, news swept through the Vogue offices that Law Roach, the man who necessitated the invention of the phrase “image architect,” had been in touch with Marco Capaldo about borrowing a dress from 16Arlington’s forthcoming London Fashion Week presentation for “Z.” (For those who aren’t familiar with the industry’s complex social mores, wearing a dress as soon as it appears on a runway is a power move; wearing it before it’s paraded for the front row is a privilege reserved for stars who look down pityingly on the rest of the A-list from some other stratosphere of fame entirely.) And, in the end, Zendaya didn’t even wear the paillette-draped design to the premiere proper; she simply slipped into it, as Law noted on Instagram, to do press interviews “before the show.”

Model Nadja Auermann was the first to debut a “gynoid” suit.

Vogue Runway

By “show”, Roach could have been referring to either Dune: Part Two or his own red-carpet coup, because Zendaya’s real look was equal parts fembot and full fashion flex. Roach sourced the bodysuit from Thierry Mugler’s fall 1995 couture presentation, which, even by the French designer’s standards, was something of a spectacle. Held at Cirque d’Hiver to commemorate the 20th anniversary of his brand, it featured a cast of supermodels (Claudia, Linda, Kate, Karen, Naomi) interspersed with porn stars and household names such as Tippi Hedren and Patty Hearst. There were latex bodysuits; an inexplicable number of Yorkshire terriers; a performance by (the now-canceled) James Brown; and the debut of the Botticelli-esque Venus gown worn by Cardi B to the 2019 Grammys.

The finale of Mugler’s fall 1995 couture offering.

Vogue Runway

It was, in short, a masterclass in what Vogue once called Mugler’s “scalpel-cut,” “aerodynamic” designs, culminating in German model Nadja Auermann strutting down the runway in a chrome-and-Plexiglass bodysuit co-designed with aircraft bodywork specialist Jean-Pierre Delcros and inspired by the work of Japanese illustrator Hajime Sorayama. Known as gynoids and immortalized by Helmut Newton in a shoot for Vogue’s November 1995 issue, the additional suits remain emblematic of Mugler’s aesthetic, influencing designers ranging from Alexander McQueen to Nicolas Ghesquière in the decades since.

The Barbie tour may have given most editors method dressing fatigue–generally speaking, the practice is less about fashion, more about costumes–but when it’s Zendaya and Law Roach doing it? It’s still as intoxicating as spice.