The Texan designer draws inspiration from Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel to design thirty looks between romantic exuberance and structural rigor.
As usual, the Parisian haute couture calendar is inaugurated by the Schiaparelli fashion show at the Petit Palais. At the foot of the staircase of the exhibition pavilion, now a museum, a crowd of photographers, paparazzi, fashion school students, fanatics and exhibitionists of all kinds await the arrival of celebrities and wealthy clients from all over the globe. The Sanchez-Bezos are hyper-photographed, she in a red suit and matching shoes, he in a black shirt unbuttoned on the chest and a gaze hidden by dark glasses, escorted by the owner of the Schiaparelli fashion house, Diego Della Valle and by the stainless former editor of Vogue Anna Wintour. The least affected by the flashes were Chiara Ferragni and her sister, for the rest a great parade of sacred monsters of cinema such as Vincent Cassel with his Brazilian girlfriend, Teyana Taylor as a queen complete with tiara, Demi Moore and Sophie Marceau. Once inside, darkness envelops everything, the room is simply decorated with a perimeter of spotlights strategically placed at the guests’ feet, directed by the production company Villa Eugénie. While an almost sacred music rises in decibels, thread-like figures slowly approach, swaying from one side of the parterre to the other: it goes on stage like this The agony and the ecstasy of Schiaparelli’s haute couture collection for spring summer 2026 according to the vision of its creative director Daniel Roseberry. The thirty looks of extraordinary magnificence take inspiration from a visit by the Texan designer to the Sistine Chapel. “Michelangelo woke up the world with his art and now, 500 years later, he has woken me up too,” explained Roseberry who, with this collection, distances himself from the archives of the maison and from the overly plowed iconography of recent years, to reach a more intimate story, made up of romantic exuberance and structural rigor obtained thanks to the talent and skill of the ateliers: the Michelangelo-esque finger of God becomes a gigantic feather that reaches from the backs of the models to touch their face. “I’m not so much interested in what I designed but rather in what I felt while creating this collection” confessed the couturier backstage. And perhaps, one of the purposes of high fashion is also this: to try to arouse something in the soul of those who look at it, those who study it, love it. Beyond purchasing, owning and doing business.
