# Back to the front: necklaces and other rear view surprises all the rage

Fashion trend for backless dresses apparent at Oscars has roots in body aesthetics and even socio-political landscape

Fashion is often used as a tool to make an impactful entrance, but in 2025, it’s a dramatic exit that’s trending.

, both The Substance’s Margaret Qualley and Wicked’s Michelle Yeoh wore diamond “backlaces” – necklaces that had been purposefully styled backwards so that they draped down the back of the spine rather than chest.




 with a rendition of Over the Rainbow, Wicked’s Ariana Grande leaned into her onscreen Glinda persona with a scarlet Schiaparelli dress. However, it was the back of the dress that really captured the theme – as the cameras panned around Grande, a ruby slipper built into the back of the bodice became visible.




Elsewhere, at the Vanity Fair after-party, Zoë Kravitz wore what on first impression appeared to be a demure high-necked and full-sleeved black silk gown. However, when The Batman star did a 360 for the cameras, she revealed that the coy gown was more provocative – thanks to a sheer cut-out panel through which her bum could be glimpsed. Online, social media users quickly christened it the “butt crack window dress”.

The backless effect is favoured by the emerging  who describes it as “sensual but not in an obvious way”. Esh recently released a collection of backless or semi-backless dresses. His “Twist” dress offers a flash of the wearer’s left shoulder blade while a halter dress consists of a V-shaped open back. Esh says he likes how the front of the dress lets you focus on the wearer’s face while a glimpse of a spine or shoulder blade feels “sexy in a non-traditional way”.




But perhaps, the trend runs deeper than just aesthetics. Backless dresses first appeared in fashion in the 1930s, an era of the Great Depression and rise of fascism. Georgina Ripley, principal curator of modern and contemporary design at the National Museum of Scotland, in Edinburgh says fashion regularly seeks “solace in nostalgia or anachronism during difficult times”.

She describes the 1930s as bearing “uncomfortable parallels with our current socio-political landscape. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that fashion is drawn to these same sartorial influences when the socio-political circumstances align.”
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