Last night’s Grammy results confirmed what had already been unfolding over the past year. While the Recording Academy’s most visible award for Record of the Year went elsewhere, the visual impact of Lady Gaga’s Mayhem continues to shape the mood of the moment. With Gaga taking home Best Dance Pop Recording and Best Pop Vocal Album, the industry has finally placed its stamp on an era that fashion observers recognised much earlier.
Since our inception in 2012, we have always paid attention to the moment when pop music stops borrowing from fashion and begins steering it. A year after its release, Abracadabra has clearly reached that point. What first appeared as a striking music video now reads like a visual reference for the darker, sharper silhouettes that have begun surfacing across both runways and stages. Some images arrive with a quiet certainty, and this is one of them.
The Engineering of a Legacy
“Abracadabra” continues to resonate because its wardrobe never chased the mood of the season. Instead, Gaga and Olivier Theyskens built the video around silhouettes that already carried weight and intention. The skeletal lines and stark contrasts gave the looks a slightly unsettling edge, which is precisely why they still feel alive long after many of last year’s fashion moments have faded.
The red latex cape and the Maximilian Gedra spiked hat have not aged a day. Haute couture is at its best when it creates a permanent image. These garments were designed to be monstrous and discomforting, which is precisely why they still command attention while the “quiet luxury” of 2025 has already faded into the background.
Tension in the Stadium
As the Mayhem Ball Tour sweeps through 2026, the “Abracadabra” aesthetic has moved from the screen to the stage. Last night’s performance—a distorted, rock-ified rendition of the track—was a masterclass in atmospheric restraint.
Gaga stood at the centre of a circle of keyboards, her face partially obscured by a birdcage helmet drawn from the Alexander McQueen Fall 2009 collection archive. Backed by Andrew Watt and Josh Freese, she exchanged large-scale choreography for something far more restrained, focusing instead on playing the synths herself.
The effect was unexpectedly intense. Rather than overwhelming the audience with spectacle, the performance allowed the atmosphere to build gradually, letting the imagery hold the room in a quieter, more deliberate way.
Editorial Notes
By Jessica Ye (Jessica Yap)
The true strength of Mayhem lies in its refusal to dilute its ideas. In a cultural landscape where trends move at dizzying speed, Gaga’s collaborations with designers such as Olivier Theyskens and the provocative collective Matières Fécales suggest a return to fashion that carries emotional and psychological weight.
As 2026 continues to unfold, that skeletal dark-pop silhouette is already appearing more frequently across fashion and performance. For those who view style as a form of expression rather than simple decoration, it signals a shift toward clothing that feels protective, theatrical, and unapologetically bold.
