GmbH Fall/Winter 2025 – 2026 / FW25 at Berlin Fashion Week

In serious times—and we are living in very serious, even terrifying times—fashion can seem frivolous. How can creativity survive under such conditions? How can we find purpose in our work as fashion designers?

Often, research for a collection starts with finding inspiration through external sources, whether books or music. But this season, we instead went inwards, looking at our own work. We began listening to music from previous shows, all while revisiting some of our favourite past GmbH looks, collections and moments. Not to be self-referential or nostalgic, but to find comfort in past ideas—from a time when the world might have seemed less threatening—and as an attempt to find one’s centre in destabilising times.

A clarity, perhaps, by looking to the past, and by working slowly and more carefully. A hermetic exercise to drown out all the noise, influence and opinions of others. Focusing instead on one’s own codes, one’s own silhouettes, one’s own heritage. (And realising in the process that many of these clothes were never shown in a physical show or truly seen before). So, our response to the initial question could only be serious, as we take our work very seriously. But what are serious clothes? Clothes of mourning?

GmbH Fall/Winter 2025 – 2026 / FW25, for the second time showing in our hometown of Berlin, we also returned to the poetry of Norwegian modernist poet Gunvor Hofmo, seeking solace in her existential works. Her introspective poetry often reflects themes rooted in personal grief and existential despair.

Loss, isolation, and melancholy—shaped by the shadows of war—feature heavily in her work. Her poem ‘From Another Reality’, which we named this collection after, so clearly cements why she has been called ‘the singer of darkness.’ The poem suggests we live in parallel worlds: we see the same things, and yet we do not perceive them the same.

While mourning might be part of it, we also thought of grace, dignity and elegance, and how these qualities can be expressed through tailoring and craft. We thought of our fathers in their suits—Benjamin’s father still never leaves the house without one, rarely seen in casual clothes. The idea of dressing up, or looking one’s best. Finding one’s own worth when society looks down on you.

Craft, in the end, is something deeply human—using one’s hands in cutting a pattern or shaping fabrics, a process both comforting and grounding. That’s why we decided to stage the show in a set of draped muslin, echoing couture salons of bygone days. The humble material will be fully repurposed in our atelier for toiles after the show.

Words by Benjamin A. Huseby & Serhat Işık

All images GmbH Fall/Winter 2025 – 2026 / FW25 by GmbH. Credit to : Creative Directors Benjamin A. Huseby & Serhat Işık, Styling Ellie Grace Cummings, Hair Ali Pirzadeh, Make Up Anri Omori, Casting Affa Osman, Music Simon Parris, Set design Stefanie Grau, Movement Direction M.J. Harper, PR Agency Reference Studios.