What’s Victoria’s Secret? How a lingerie show became a must-watch fashion runway

Earlier this week, adjacent to 3 cardinal group tuned successful to watch nan 2025 version of nan Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show - nan high-profile catwalk arena wherever near-naked models and celebrities return complete nan runway.

Like each year, family names specified arsenic Adriana Lima, Gisele Bündchen, and sisters Gigi and Bella Hadid strolled successful different variations of nan brand’s bejewelled bikinis and underwear sets. The runway stayed existent to nan label’s signature operation of imagination and sensuality: crystal-studded lingerie, lace corsets, satin bodysuits, and melodramatic wings aliases capes that echoed nan show’s early-2000s heyday. Each look was paired pinch oversized jewellery, feathered accessories, and glossy makeup, to lucifer nan unmistakable Victoria’s Secret artistic of hyper-glamour and spectacle that has agelong made nan show a world pop-culture staple.

This year’s arena besides introduced a fewer firsts. It marked nan debut of a master jock connected nan runway, WNBA prima Angel Reese, who wore a civilization floral lingerie group pinch feathered wings. It besides featured nan first ever K-Pop performance, nan South Korean group TWICE, and nan first latinx capacity pinch Karol G’s appearance. Both moves were an effort to diversify Victoria’s Secret’s image and link pinch younger, world audiences.

Although talk astir assemblage positivity, inclusivity, and nan objectification of women predominate nan manner industry, it’s striking that an arena truthful tied to a circumstantial benignant of glamorised beauty thrives. The Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show continues to observe an ultra-stylised, one-dimensional imagination of femininity, yet it still attracts millions of viewers and hefty investment. The accumulation remains a multi-million-dollar enterprise, powered by sponsors, personage partnerships, and streaming deals.

So really did a lingerie parade, primitively designed to beforehand nan brand’s intimates and sleepwear collections, execute taste arena status? And a full batch of glitz, glitter and glamour on nan way…

Exclusivity versus spectacle

The cardinal to Victoria’s Secret’s occurrence lies wrong its branding and bully aged American showmanship. When nan institution staged its first manner show successful 1995, it was simply a trading instrumentality to beforehand its lingerie and sleepwear collections. Unlike nan discreet displays of Paris aliases Milan, Victoria’s Secret instantly treated its runway for illustration a theatrical shape alternatively of a elemental income floor, arsenic they realised that lingerie could beryllium wide marketed by trading a imagination to millions who could watch from nan comfortableness of their homes.

Through nan precocious 1990s and early 2000s, Victoria’s Secret built a story astir its models and its image. The “Angels”, adorned pinch crystal wings, became cardinal to its storytelling. This accordant ocular branding created thing different manner weeks lacked: continuity.

Paris, Milan and London prized designer individuality; Victoria’s Secret offered a single, repeatable personality that was amplified by its televised format. By moving to web premier clip successful 2001, nan institution turned a unit promotion into a world broadcast, pinch supermodels for illustration Tyra Banks and Gisele Bündchen stepping alongside unrecorded performances by stars specified arsenic Justin Timberlake aliases Taylor Swift. The thought was to merge fashion, popular music, and mainstream entertainment.

So while nan runways of Paris, Milan, and London speak to insiders, nan Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show speaks straight to consumers and seeks to democratise manner by inviting viewers to participate successful a spectacle of aspiration alternatively than artistry.

This year’s Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show drew astir 3 cardinal unrecorded viewers worldwide, while European manner shows - including those astatine Paris aliases Milan Fashion Week - propulsion successful only hundreds of thousands of livestream viewers per runway and trust much connected property sum and societal media scope than connected wide broadcast audiences.

In 2014, nan Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show had its peak: it drew much than 9 cardinal U.S. viewers and was broadcast successful astir 200 countries, efficaciously turning a unit run into a world taste export. Shortly after, successful 2019, a crisp driblet successful viewership and nationalist backlash complete nan removal of plus-size and transgender models forced nan institution to cancel nan Fashion Show.

But its revival successful 2024 and 2025 came pinch force, showing that nan marque is still strong: Victoria’s Secret & Co. presently has a marketplace headdress of astir US $2.42 cardinal (€2bn) arsenic of October 2025, and their latest reports show a 36% gross margin.

So while French and Italian houses specify their powerfulness done scarcity and heritage, Victoria’s Secret has built its power done ubiquity and performance. Chanel aliases Dior could ne'er consequence turning their haute couture runways into popular concerts without undermining their exclusivity. Victoria’s Secret, by contrast, operates wrong mass-market retail, a assemblage that thrives connected visibility.