Stephen Jones Recalls Big Hat Moments of the 1980s With Spring 2025 Collection

It’s a big year for Stephen Jones , who’s readying a major exhibition at Paris’ Palais Galliera that will feature more than 400 works and delve into the milliner’s collaborations over the past 40 years with brands and designers including Dior , John Galliano, Jean Paul Gaultier and Thierry Mugler .

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For spring 2025, he’s taken an even closer look at some of those relationships, in particular the designs he created for Azzedine Alaïa , Claude Montana and Mugler.

“They all loved Brancusi, and so do I. The hats are based the designs I did for them in the 1980s, the era of the grand silhouette,” Jones said during a walk-through at his Covent Garden shop and atelier.

Much of this collection reflects the Romanian sculptor’s glittering, twisted organic shapes.

One hat, a gold beret perched on a wire, looks as if it’s flying off the head. It was originally made for Mugler.

The Alaïa styles are more delicate – and less flighty.

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There’s a beret dotted with metal-edged eyelets, a broderie anglaise bucket style lined in tulle, and a big, squashy sunhat, also with eyelet fabric. There is also a hat made from a tangle of tall headbands in black and Champagne.

Jones also recounted how the hats came about, with Alaïa asking him: “Stephen, tu va chicer le chapeau?” while Mugler’s direction was “Bigger, more rhinestones.” Montana wanted him to take a more sensual approach. “Darling,” he said. “It must hug the face.”

Jones listened to them all, and now a new generation gets to experience that oversized, dramatic 1980s moment.

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