Westwood | Kawakubo at NGV International

This summer, the NGV brings together two titans of fashion – English designer Vivienne Westwood and Comme des Garçons founder Rei Kawakubo – for a world-premiere exhibition exploring five decades of transformative style. Running from December 7, 2025 to April 19, 2026, Westwood | Kawakubo features more than 140 garments from across the two designers’ storied careers. Though shaped by different cultures and eras, the British punk pioneer and the avant-garde Japanese visionary share an uncompromising instinct for reinvention, using fashion to challenge conventions of taste, gender and beauty.

Expect dramatic silhouettes, playful distortions of form and nods to historical dress turned upside down. Thematically arranged around concepts like The Power of Clothes, Punk and Provocation, and Reinvention, the exhibition draws from both international loans and recent acquisitions by the NGV.

Standout Westwood works include early punk ensembles popularised by bands like the Sex Pistols and Siouxsie Sioux; a tartan gown from the 1993–94 Anglomania collection once worn by Kate Moss; and the original corseted wedding dress made famous by Sarah Jessica Parker in Sex and the City: The Movie. On Kawakubo’s side of things, you’ll see the sculptural petal look worn by Rihanna on the Met Gala red carpet, plus pieces seen on Lady Gaga, Katy Perry and Tracee Ellis Ross, the exhibition charts her ongoing subversion of fashion norms.

Expect striking gingham forms from Kawakubo’s Body Meets Dress – Dress Meets Body (1997), experimental designs from Two Dimensions (2012) and Invisible Clothes (2017), and dramatic gallery moments where Westwood’s sweeping silk gowns sit alongside Kawakubo’s punk-inspired vinyl and jacquard. A world-first accompanying publication also features insights from leading fashion thinkers including Jane Mulvaugh, Valerie Steele, Stephen Jones, Akiko Fukai and Dame Zandra Rhodes.

Tickets are on sale now, with member, concession and family prices available.

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