What is the message hidden behind the “Protect the Dolls” T-shirt carried by celebrities?

This is the story of a white message t-shirt which, shortly after being worn by the American stylist Conner Ives at the end of his fall-winter 2025 parade in London, has become a real phenomenon, passing from simple everyday clothes with political weapons. We are talking about the 100% printed cotton printed cotton t-shirt “Protect the Dolls” (protect dolls, in French). Only here: the term “dolls” does not only refer to the “dolls”, but is addressed directly to transgender women, since it resumed an expression that first for the 1980s in the Drag-Queens community. “Protect trans women,” we must read.

“This support is more necessary than ever”

The success is immediate. “The next morning, we woke up with an email box that only asked:” Where do I buy that? “,” Explains the creator New York Times . And to continue: “We delivered around 1000 units in the morning and, in the middle of the afternoon, they were all parties. We had never seen such a response rate. Before, perhaps we treated 50 to 60 orders per month. ” As of April 18, the net turnover amounted to 190,235 pounds, or around 223,717 euros. Unheard of for this graduate of the Central Saint Martins, the prestigious London fashion school, 29 years old.

It’s hard to get excited to all of this. It is so overwhelming to think that it is the world in which we must live, that this is the declaration that we must make in 2025.

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Conner Ives au «New York Times»

It must be said that this play arrives in a very specific context, asserting itself as a direct response to the policy of Donald Trump which weakens the rights of transgender people, but not only. As a reminder, the British Supreme Court recently decreed that the legal definition of a woman is biological sex, stretching the Trans community. “Given the current hostility of the American federal government to transgender people, this support is more than ever necessary,” reads the brand’s shopping site which, given the success of the T-shirt, has decided to offer it pre-order. The profits generated by this clothing put up for sale for 88 euros are then donated to Trans Lifeline, an American charitable association which offers telephone assistance to transgender people.

We have seen many celebrities wear this t-shirt in recent months. The singer Troye Sivan already during the first weekend of the Coachella festival in California. Then actor Pedro Pascal at the London preview of the film Thunderbolts, April 22. But also the creator Haider Ackermann alongside actress Tilda Swinton, who herself posted a selfie dressed in this same T-shirt. A craze mixed with a commercial success that surprises Conner Ives, but does not make it happier, as he entrusted to New York Times : “It’s hard to get excited to all of this. It is so overwhelming to think that it is the world in which we must live, that this is the declaration that we must make in 2025. ”