Serving the Spring Summer 2026 fashion feast
Variations on femininity (and cake).
Greetings from a fabulous fashion dungeon. I’ve been in the depths of Vogue Runway and Instagram, devouring the Spring/Summer 2026 shows. I’m no trend forecaster, nor a slave to trends. In fact, I write this whilst cocooned in oversized everything. I’m gaslighting you with the above image, but it feels appropriate. One thing I can truthfully tell you is that I get great pleasure from pulling design ideas together and neatly tying them in a bow.
(Sidenote: I also really love cake. I’m currently based in New York so it’s with the utmost sadness that I cannot watch The Great British Bake Off. It seems that my withdrawal symptoms are drawing unlikely parallels between fashion and cake out of me. It’s a stretch I know but go with me on this. Indulge me).
Why does it matter might you ask? Why bother tying it all in a bloody bow? Maybe I’m a psychopath desperately searching for an impossible solution? Or maybe it’s because I’m of the opinion that fashion designers are the contemporary cultural noses, if you will, of our time. They sniff it all out: politics, irl and online dialogue, the way we live at home and at work, what we’re watching, listening to, eating, drinking, desiring, despising. All those seemingly random but deeply connected notes are then layered, distilled and bottled into an oh-so-pleasing, or sometimes alarming, collection. I’m here to tell you dear reader that if SS26 was a perfume, it would be called Madam.
To clarify, the definition of Madam is:
How liberating huh? Maybe, just maybe, we can be all of those things! It’s not all rainbows and pussy bows though. Madam might be frothy and flirty but she’s certainly not fruity and floral. What a relief not to be faced with the repetitive floral adage rolled out for spring/summer. Miranda Priestly would approve.
SS26 was all about femininity. Duhh, I hear you drawl. Well no. Quiet luxury (urgh I’m bored of even spelling it out), trainers, tailoring etc. has been the predominant expression of femininity ever since Phoebe Philo stepped out in a pair of Stan Smiths post her Celine show in 2015. Rip Old Celine. That’s ten years of comfort, of no make up, of artfully messy hair tucked into collars and roll necks, wide trousers and shoes to stomp in. Don’t get me wrong, I adore this failsafe look but it can’t be the only look.
SS26 feels ever more potent a collection in the fashion calendar because it is the first time all of the reshuffled designers have debuted their collections as one. The musical chairs is finally over, bums are firmly on seats, and it seems that collectively the designers have decided we need a more diverse interpretation of what it is to be a woman today.
To use a (desperate) Bake Off inspired comparison the designers have sieved the sugar of femininity and it’s landed on one of three sweet treats — a frilly patisserie towering gateaux, a neat as fuck petite pud,or a glossy, sumptuous jelly. All showstoppers, all deserve a handshake if you ask me (although less of Paul more of Prue please). Heck, some designers are after star baker (the winning prize) and have baked all three.
Let’s start with those ambitious designers…
Sarah Burton’s second collection for Givenchy answered all of our feminine wishes. She took us from the boardroom to the ballroom. Get you a girl that can do both and all that. Her debut fall 2025 collection back in March had the top four most saved images from that season on Vogue Runway. The statistics back her up; she inherently knows how women want to feel and look in their clothes.
Faced with this collection Burton asked, “Instead of going to all the male archetypes to empower a woman, I thought, ‘How do you empower a woman through feminine archetypes?’” She’s directly following in Alexander McQueen’s path, moving from his namesake brand onto the helm at Givenchy, but she’s reduced the fashion industry’s convoluted fuss to a simple truism. “It’s been a lot of things, Givenchy. It’s important to set its silhouette, its woman, its cut. It’s important to give it clarity at the beginning”. Indeed we hear her loud and clear. She gives us the perfect white shirt, the babydoll mini dress, the androgynous suit, the all encompassing trench coat, jeans that make your legs go on and on and bare if you dare tulle dresses. What’s not to love? There’s something for everyone because there’s never just one look or emotion we want to convey day after day.
Miuccia Prada addressed a much ignored representation of women across both her Miu Miu and Prada SS26 collections. She pondered how “We in fashion always talk about glamour or rich people, but we have to recognise also that life is very difficult and to me the apron contains the real difficult life of women in history, from factories to the home.” Please god, someone send a Bake Off contestant a Miu Miu apron. The bullet bras poke at the aprons too, ooh là là!
You might interpret Miuccia’s recognition as grossly uncomfortable for these said aprons will undoubtedly have a hefty price tag, but she is at the very least acknowledging and celebrating all parts of womanhood. Her interpretation reminds me of the beautiful serenity found in Caroline Walker’s painting. Miuccia and Caroline aren’t encouraging women ‘to keep a nice home’ so to speak, they’re celebrating women’s resilience and strength. They’re elevating the paid and unpaid labour that women endure onto a grander stage, giving them the recognition they deserve.
The fashion conglomerates should take note. Female designers have an intellectual edge, they get it, and most blatantly they sell, so why so little at the top? Hopefully we’ll see less pale and male when the legacy house cards next reshuffle their creative director deck of cards. The recent announcement of Grace Wales Bonner as the creative director of menswear at Hermès, and the first black woman ever to do so, has had a deservedly rapturous reception.
Shout out to Anthony Vaccerello at Saint Laurent for star baker also. His ss26 show hit all three notes. You want Marie? Trad? Mob? Anthony delivers just as Miuccia and Sarah Burton have, by catering to all moods and modes of womanhood. He explains, “She goes from radical leather, a kind of hard woman that goes softly, softly, softly into these dresses…but she’s the same woman. She’s not as soft as we think.”
Ok, time to pause. Go pop the kettle on and dig into a slice of cake.
Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you’ll have noticed that Marie Antoinette is back in a big (wig) way. As soon as I return to London I’ll head straight to the Victoria and Albert museum to revel in their exhibition dedicated to Antoinette’s hedonistic style, that’s if I can get my mitts on a ticket. Maybe I can sneak in under a bustle?
Manolo Blahnik has long been infatuated with Antoinette. He inhaled all things Antoinette as a child in the Canary Islands. Later he shared his obsession with Karl Lagerfeld who then suggested to Sofia Coppola that Blahnik design the shoes for her 2006 cult film starring Kirsten Dunst. Today we can slip on our fashion fantasy for size via Blahnik’s 11 dazzling Rococo-inspired shoe designs in celebration, and as the sponsor, of the V and A exhibition. What fun!
I might not be able to nose around the V and A just yet but I can dip into this delicious book on the shelf in the apartment I’m renting. It’s a magnificent catalogue of Coppola’s decadence and voluptuous use of texture and palette in her film making. Be still my beating heart! It seems the fashion industry have since caught the Antoinette hysteria.
If Alessandra Rich’s interpretation feels a little too whimsical let me point you in the sturdier direction of Simone Rocha, the doyenne and darling of the London fashion scene. For SS26 Simone “wanted to propose a playful perspective on femininity, with all its twists and turns.” The collection was like a best-bits album of her career. There were bows (obvi), flowers, sequins, clunky shoes, little panties, big dresses. This all sounds very princess but when it comes to Simone’s style signifiers, there’s always something askew, it’s a little off, which is the very thing that makes you want to put it on. I especially enjoyed how she used brown tape for bows and popped lilies into pockets.
Simone describes the ambivalence for this collection as a “slightly teenage, debutante feeling, when you’re on display and you don’t really want to be there.” You can picture the Simone girlies huffing and puffing in the corner of the room, less interested in small talk and more interested in the bakes.
My two worlds collided in the opening scene of the final series of And Just Like That, when Carrie Bradshaw skips down her staircase in full Simone. Simone meet Carrie. Carrie meet Simone.
A resounding theme across the board for ss26 was the need for fluff, whether thats via Stella McCartney’s FEVVERS, the world’s first plant-based and cruelty free alternative to feathers, or Louise Trotter’s shimmering craftswomanship at Bottega Veneta, or Matthieu Blazy’s mophead-but-fashion accessories at Chanel. The fluff injects a much needed sense of aliveness, of energy into these legacy houses. Maybe you’ve got to hear the look before you see the look?
Matthieu announced in his show notes that under his guidance at Chanel, “above all, there is an idea of freedom, of a new universal dress and a borderless blending of styles; the inheritance of not just one Chanel woman, but rather, of Chanel women”. Come one, come all.
Meanwhile Connor Ives went full Taylor Swift showgirl with his application of feathers, nodding to Antoinettes affection for the feather boa.
If pink feels too sweet and sickly, there’s always cerulean, sky or baby blue…
Ok come with me on this gear shift. Swap Taylor for Raye’s whopping Where The Hell Is My Husband!
Tradwife with a twist:
Ick really? Well yes. I told you designers soak all the social and cultural commentary in. Much to my dismay the tradwife phenomenon is taking off. I even walked past the Tradwife University on the corner of Allen and Grand Street the other day for Pete’s sake! That being said, it’s based on an illusion, for all those tradwife influencers are in fact getting paid to post. I’m not sure cleaning and cooking would be so appealing if they weren’t.
This is what the tradwife would be serving, bakes that are compact, prim and neat as a pin.
She wipes crumbs from your cheek and whispers in your ear “The magic ingredient? Oh it’s the poisonous mushrooms!” Just like Simone did with the debs, Tory Burch and Miuccia Prada have taken the twin sets and the classic 1950’s silhouette and f***ed it up. They’re arousing instead and released from house arrest. The underwear is showing, the palette is lurid.
She’s a more stripped back version of Antoinette, her younger sister let’s say, who prefers Gossip Girl over Sofia Coppola. I don’t know, let’s call her Blair. Her beauty reference? Betty Draper and Todd Haynes’ Carol.
See also the beauty industry clapping their hands at our renewed appreciation for make up. Goodbye barely there make up, hello full glam. Just look at Hermes lipstick's and Louis Vuitton’s recent luxury make up launch. Both eye wateringly expensive, both clickety clakerty in their retro style gilt packaging. Vuitton’s beauty accessories are laughable in their extravagance but why not? I long to be this level of put together but alas I’ll never be. A flash of red lipstick will have to do.
Tradwife run free? Go mob wife à la Alex Consani in that Gucci coat.
For those that find the above the palette too dizzying or daft, might I suggest you try on these feminine troupes for size in monochrome instead?
Valentino and Schiaparelli = Tradwife with a twist
Brandon Maxwell = Marie Antoinette
Saint Laurent = Monochrome Mob wife.
Cruella is serving @sienna.world
Still craving some florals for spring? Alright, alright. Look to David Koma’s exotic fleurs.
The Little Black dress:
Alessandra Rich=Marie Antoinette
Prada=Tradwife with a twist.
The Little White Dress is giving us all the feminine feels:
The perfect white shirt:
A plain white shirt. That couldn’t possibly have anything to do with Marie Antoinette right? Wrong. Antoinette popularised cotton after she wore a white muslin dress for her portrait painted by Madame Vigée-Lebrun in 1783 that was deemed scandalous for it’s sheerness and simplicity. Antoinette was the OG influencer. Suddenly the world wanted to wear white and as a result unintentionally, she accelerated the slave cotton trade. Just when you thought the frivolity was over, Marie Antoinette even influenced your most simple and chic wardrobe item.
So there you have it, ss26 served on a silver platter. Whether you opt for Marie, Trad, Mob, or Monochrome, remember you’re a Madam and you can do whatever the hell you want! Do as Paul and Prue do. Sample all the cakes, puds and jellies.
Freaking OBSESSED. P.S. Check out Canonbury Press's pudding-themed greeting cards - glossy jellies galore, you'd love
Pure joy! Informative, inspiring, exciting!