It’s not uncommon for fashion brands to cross over with musicians, but many of the biggest music collabs tend to focus on a few musical genres. Pop stars and rappers like Beyoncé, Tyla and Britney Spears are common collaboration targets for fashion brands.
But recently, rock music has started to make a comeback in fashion circles. Designer brands like Cucculelli Shaheen, Zadig & Voltaire and Nili Lotan have started to collaborate with rock artists, incorporate rock music into their live shows and incorporate the imagery of classic rock bands of the previous decades.
Rock’s minority status among fashion music collaborations reflects its place in the musical zeitgeist. In 2008, rock songs made up around 20% of the Billboard Top 100 chart. By 2016, it was down to just 2.2% as pop and hip-hop came to dominate popular music.
But, according to the entertainment data insights company Luminate, which publishes a yearly report on music trends, rock is making a comeback. On streaming platforms in 2025 so far, rock sits in second place among core genres, with 123.3 billion streams, behind hip-hop and R&B, with 171 billion streams. That puts rock ahead of pop music, with only 83 billion streams. It has also had the largest growth among genres in the top 10, according to Luminate’s data.
Designer Nili Lotan has always had a close connection with rock music through her husband, singer and guitarist David Broza. Her brand, now with revenue of over $100 million per year, launched a new campaign this month featuring the rock band The Kills. The British duo both appeared in Nili Lotan’s Fall 2025 marketing campaign and performed at the collection’s launch event at the Café Carlyle in New York.
The collection also featured bags named after famous rockers like the Keith and the Jagger.
“Music has always filled my life, and it’s something I enjoy and am inspired by,” Lotan told Glossy. ”What speaks to me about rock is the attitude behind it. It’s not so much about the music, but it’s that free spirit on stage, the fearlessness and the boldness that I’m drawn to and that inspire me. It’s not about perfection, it’s about living one’s truth, which is how I think about fashion, too.”
Several other brands have worked with rock bands, either for IRL events or as brand ambassadors, in the past two months.
This past New York Fashion Week, Anthony Cucculelli and Anna Shaheen, the founders and designers of Cucculelli, incorporated rock music into their Spring 2026 runway show. Rock band The Thing set up at the end of the runway and played throughout the entirety of the show. Another designer brand, Zadig & Voltaire, announced last week that rock singer Paris Jackson, daughter of Michael Jackson, would be its new brand ambassador.
But then there are brands working with legacy rock bands. Dsquared2 announced a collaboration with the classic rock band KISS last month, while Alice + Olivia is getting set to debut its second collection in collaboration with the Grateful Dead.
Stacey Bendet, founder of Alice + Olivia, told Glossy that working with an iconic musical act with decades of history, like the Grateful Dead, presents a rich opportunity for collaboration. The Grateful Dead, in particular, have a variety of memorable imagery associated with them, from the famous skull-and-lightning logo to the colorful bears that adorned the back cover of their 1973 album “History of the Grateful Dead, Volume One (Bear’s Choice).” Both images are featured in a new Alice + Olivia collection launching on November 12.
“A lot of times, we want to collaborate with brands or bands who are celebrating something,” Bendet told Glossy. This new collection commemorates the Grateful Dead’s 60th anniversary. “We want to do things that feel culturally relevant. My customer loves to be fun and playful and loves a bit of rock-and-roll. So this resonates with our customer and with me as a designer.”
