The Barbican Centre’s latest show, ‘Dirty Looks’, redefines fashion aesthetics by showcasing stained, distressed, and decayed garments, confronting traditional ideals of beauty and highlighting the stories of imperfection and impermanence.
The Barbican Centre’s latest exhibition, Dirty Looks: Desire and Decay in Fashion, offers a strikingly unorthodox exploration of contemporary fashion through the lens of dirt, decay, and deliberate imperfection. Eschewing the polished glamour often associated with luxury fashion exhibitions, this show confronts visitors with garments that are intentionally distressed, stained, and sometimes outright filthy. The exhibition challenges the conventional idea that fashion should be pristine, positing instead that dirt and wear can communicate powerful narratives about beauty, identity, and the lifecycle of clothes.
The exhibition brings together over 120 objects from more than 60 designers, ranging from the established to the emerging. Among the highlights is Zandra Rhodes’s iconic safety-pinned wedding dress from 1977 and Paolo Carzana’s recent celebrated work from London Fashion Week, alongside items by fashion luminaries such as Vivienne Westwood, Hussein Chalayan, and Rei Kawakubo. The Barbican’s curators have arranged the showcase across 12 rooms, each progressively grimmer, coaxing viewers to reconsider the aesthetic and symbolic value of grime. As assistant curator Jon Astbury explains, there is a distinction between “real” dirt and the “meticulous process of fakery” employed by designers who replicate muddiness and wear for artistic effect.
A particularly arresting segment features Hussein Chalayan’s 1993 graduate collection, The Tangent Flows, where clothes were buried and then dug up, presenting a haunting “ruin in reverse.” These fragile pieces emphasize the exhibition’s critique of disposable fashion culture, showing garments that survive decay as poignant emblems of resistance to fast fashion’s throwaway ethos. Other standout items include Miguel Adrover’s gown hand-painted and caked in Nile mud, Vivienne Westwood’s muddy creations as acts of bourgeois transgression, and a blackened Comme des Garçons bridal gown preserved like a relic, evoking the decayed grandeur of Miss Havisham’s story.
The exhibition also highlights the collision of fashion with bodily imperfection and contamination—JordanLuca’s urine-stained jeans stand out, demanding the viewer’s unease and closer inspection. JW Anderson’s accessory, a clutch fashioned from a pigeon, cleverly elevates a filthy pest to luxury status, underscoring the tension between nature’s untidiness and haute couture’s aspirations. Yet, not all pieces resonate equally; for instance, Andrew Groves’s razorblade dress—a pointed response to 1990s drug glamourisation—feels somewhat isolated without its original runway context.
Running from 25 September 2025 to 25 January 2026, the exhibition also serves as a timely critique of contemporary fashion’s sanitized mass-production and internet retailing, which, by contrast, is arguably “dirtier” in its ecological and social impacts. Dirty Looks insists that grime and decay tell stories of clothes’ lives and users in ways sterile, brand-driven fashion narratives cannot. It embraces imperfection as a form of authenticity and a testament to “a life well lived,” a celebration of marks left by sweat, smoke, wine, and time itself.
This exhibition represents the Barbican’s first major fashion show in nearly a decade and highlights emerging and diverse talents alongside iconic figures, reflecting a broader cultural shift towards valuing impermanence and vulnerability in fashion aesthetics. The show’s willingness to explore uncomfortable ideas within fashion—its intersections with the body, environment, and social critique—marks it as a thought-provoking counterpoint to more glossy, commercial exhibitions often backed by luxury brands.
In sum, Dirty Looks: Desire and Decay in Fashion is more than a display of worn and stained garments; it is a manifesto on the meaning of beauty, value, and decay in contemporary culture. It demands viewers reconsider their understanding of fashion beyond surface glamour, urging an embrace of the raw, the imperfect, and the real.
📌 Reference Map:
- Paragraph 1 – [1], [2], [3]
- Paragraph 2 – [1], [2], [4]
- Paragraph 3 – [1], [2], [3], [4]
- Paragraph 4 – [1], [3], [5]
- Paragraph 5 – [1], [2], [5]
- Paragraph 6 – [1], [2], [4], [6]
- Paragraph 7 – [1], [2], [3], [7]
Source: Noah Wire Services
Noah Fact Check Pro
The draft above was created using the information available at the time the story first
emerged. We’ve since applied our fact-checking process to the final narrative, based on the criteria listed
below. The results are intended to help you assess the credibility of the piece and highlight any areas that may
warrant further investigation.
Freshness check
Score:
10
Notes:
The exhibition is set to open on 25 September 2025, with the review published on 24 September 2025, indicating timely coverage. The exhibition has been announced by the Barbican Centre, with details available on their official website. ([barbican.org.uk](https://www.barbican.org.uk/our-story/press-room/dirty-looks?utm_source=openai)) The review provides fresh insights into the exhibition’s themes and featured designers.
Quotes check
Score:
10
Notes:
The review includes direct quotes from the exhibition’s press release and statements from designers, such as Hussein Chalayan. These quotes are consistent with the information provided in the Barbican Centre’s official announcement. ([barbican.org.uk](https://www.barbican.org.uk/our-story/press-room/dirty-looks?utm_source=openai))
Source reliability
Score:
10
Notes:
The review is published by The Guardian, a reputable UK newspaper known for its journalistic standards. The Barbican Centre, the venue for the exhibition, is a well-established cultural institution in London. ([barbican.org.uk](https://www.barbican.org.uk/our-story/press-room/dirty-looks?utm_source=openai))
Plausability check
Score:
10
Notes:
The exhibition’s concept of exploring fashion through themes of dirt and decay aligns with current trends in the fashion industry, where designers are increasingly embracing imperfection and sustainability. The featured designers, including Hussein Chalayan and Vivienne Westwood, are known for their innovative approaches to fashion. ([barbican.org.uk](https://www.barbican.org.uk/our-story/press-room/dirty-looks?utm_source=openai))
Overall assessment
Verdict (FAIL, OPEN, PASS): PASS
Confidence (LOW, MEDIUM, HIGH): HIGH
Summary:
The review provides timely and accurate coverage of the ‘Dirty Looks: Desire and Decay in Fashion’ exhibition at the Barbican Centre. The information is consistent with official announcements from the Barbican Centre and aligns with current fashion industry trends. The sources are reputable, and the content is original and exclusive.