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You don’t walk into a Schiaparelli show thinking you’ll see roses and butterflies. For that, you have to crane your neck so high, you’d rather just let fantasy run wild, whatever that could be. The Schiaparelli Haute Couture S/S26 collection asked for it: the fantasy, the wildness, the imagination. Like the Sistine Chapel itself, this was fashion that refused eye level. Look up, it insisted. Stop thinking. Start feeling.
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Daniel Roseberry titled this collection The Agony and the Ecstasy, and the reference was not subtle, nor was it meant to be. Inspired by a visit to the Sistine Chapel and the fever-dream drama of book-turned-film, the collection reminds us that couture has always lived somewhere between suffering and transcendence. What is more agonizing than the cost of couture? What is more ecstatic than the company you keep while wearing it?
An Ecosystem of Extremes
The show was a procession in its celestial ascent and mythological ambush tendencies. Bodies arrived transformed into creatures: avian, aquatic, venomous, divine. Flowers floated above shoulders as if gravity had clocked out. Spikes erupted from collars, hips, and waists. Lace no longer lay flat; it rose in bas-relief, casting shadows like sculpted frescoes. Beneath it all, layers of neon tulle smoldered, stacked to create a soft-focus haze, the couture equivalent of sfumato—edges blurred, emotions sharpened.
This was not angelic beauty. Wings appeared, but these belonged to a chimera: a dangerous woman made of contradictions, power, and threat. Think scorpion tails arcing from backs in delicate Chantilly lace or horned bodices, spined shoulders, and silhouettes that suggested venom could be close by. Couture met haute animalier, and neither blinked first.
Roseberry called these figures his infantas terribles, and they ruled the runway accordingly. One look, nicknamed “Isabella Blowfish,” puffed itself into theatrical importance with layers of tulle and organza, dusted in crystal shadows and finished with organza spikes. Elsewhere, jackets bristled like exotic birds mid-display, their colors pulled from birds of paradise: electric blues, acidic greens, sunburnt pink, and saffron that hovered between holy and hazardous.
Black wool dresses carried unexpected mutations—trompe l’oeil crocodile tails embroidered down the front, tulle bustles exploding at the back like divine aftershocks. Transparent suits in gleaming crinoline appeared pierced with spines, recalling poisonous fish rendered in couture discipline. The extremes were deliberate.
Accessories joined the ecosystem. Artificial bird heads perched on bags and jewelry, sculpted from silk feathers with resin beaks and pearl cabochon eyes. Fantastical, but also deeply Schiaparelli. Elsa’s lifelong fascination with creatures of sea and sky surfaced again, alongside her beloved symbols: the keyhole as portal, the body as canvas, fashion as question rather than answer.
Looking Up, At Last
Yet, for all its drama, this collection was rooted in feeling. Roseberry has said this season marked a shift—from asking how something should look to asking how it feels to make it. That relief was visible. Couture loosened its grip on perfection and found freedom inside responsibility. Structure remained, but imagination slipped its leash.
The opening and closing looks said it all: sculptural jackets shaped like hummingbirds, talons jutting from coned breasts, wings rising from necklines, worn with slim trousers that grounded the fantasy just enough to make it unsettling. Gods and monsters shared the same runway. Dreams brushed against nightmares. The ceiling never felt so close.
Couture, Roseberry shows us, isn’t meant for daily life. It exists for the hopeful adolescent who chose fantasy over practicality. For the moment when you stop thinking and let wonder take over. This season, Schiaparelli didn’t ask us to look forward or backward. It asked us to look up. Onward and upward, the flight of fantasy continues.
Photos: SCHIAPARELLI
