Paris Fashion Week
After the nerve-wracking heights of last September’s designer debut season, Fall-Winter 2026 felt like a walk in the park. Designers soundly delivered on their visions, extending technique, narrative, and silhouette with stricter editing and visual cohesion. This season, Paris was technically sound, self-assured, and destined for consumer wardrobes.
The week at a glance
Paris Fashion Week began with a 360-degree view into the mind of Jonathan Anderson, as he presented his fifth Dior runway, and second women’s ready-to-wear. What followed was a garden party of flouncy peplum tops and coats, cropped Bar jackets, and embellished straight-leg jeans. However, it was strictly business backstage. Anderson, when speaking to the press prior to his show about the direction of collection, which featured an entire wardrobe of collectibles, said, “Repetition product is not selling, but that’s where the margin was.”
The solution? Anderson is determined to give a “why” to every single item he intends to sell, including introducing fewer bags, but making sure they are the right bags. “Small amounts to get it right,” he said.
The same week, Matthieu Blazy’s first Chanel collection dropped in stores, and the results were all anyone could talk about – mostly because it was the editors, buyers, and long-time clients packing the dressing rooms. Blogger BryanBoy told Vogue Business, “I’ve never seen such frenzy and fracas when all the editors are shopping, since Alessandro Michele’s debut collection for Gucci a decade ago.” The standout piece was the long-sleeve shirt developed in partnership with Charvet, with “Chanel” embroidery at the hem. The €3,900 shirt, amongst other items, is now sold out. Then, at the Chanel FW26 show, reporters noted nearly all the attendees were wearing their new Chanel shoes, jackets, and bags.
Both the silhouettes at Dior and Chanel showed a significant shifting of the mood; Dior’s top-heavy prettiness and slouchy denim, and Chanel’s super low-waisted, belted skirts and dresses that appeared to drop Dior’s peplum shape right to the ankle, spoke to a new effortlessness that rests on outfitting, rather than the body. The kicks of fabrics and exaggerated shapes are certainly set to become mainstream, something for merchandisers to consider when forecasting for the season ahead.
Along with these two mega houses, Dries Van Noten, Givenchy, and Celine all played along this sort of DIY self-styling concept, as if to say, take what we’ve given you and make it your own. Anderson mentioned he has thousands of looks ready to go in the atelier; this leads us to believe the Dior vision is built on longevity; it’s all a matter of edit and nuance for each new collection.
Overall, save for the strict tailoring and utility inflections, the clothing in Paris was optimistic and fun; some parts polished punk, and others a dash of 80s club, but not without being tuned into reality. Miuccia Prada, as usual, zoomed out on the insular fashion world to relay that her Miu Miu collection was about how we are all just insigificant specks in the world at large.
Runway highlights
Tom Ford by Haider Ackermann proved to be a sartorial standout this season, with the theatrical performance-like runway featuring both male and female models. They sauntered slowly in delightfully seductive and devil-may-care tailoring and eveningwear, with harsh shapes reminiscent of American Psycho-style suiting.
Sharp, sculptural tailoring was a major through-line throughout the Paris collections, especially for rigorously buttoned-up coats and suit jackets. Labels like McQueen, Hermès and Givenchy leaned into strong shapes and structure, while Miu Miu’s skirt suits, though resolutely up and down in silhouette, felt softened and subdued; a certain utilitarian heaviness despite the lightweight construction. Chanel doubled-down on the skirt suits with beautiful restraint; black skirt suits in a ribbed merino wool and silk, others embroidered with chainmail and flapper-style connotations.
Structure and sculpture were mixed with more feminine elements and sporty silhouettes at shows like Isabel Marant, Chloe, and Stella McCartney, which saw straight leg and slouchy jeans shoved into boots, and coupled with bomber jackets, sporty jerseys, and 70s-style puffy blouses.
The collections continued to back fur, in stoles, hats, capes and trims, while funnel necks and cinched, belted waists in leather jackets and trench coats are retaining their place in the fall wardrobe. Blazers and shirts with mao collars are beginning to step into the spotlight. Layering remains key to the winter concept of personally-first dressing, with layering already clocking up 85M TikTok views. Colours of navy, camel brown, purple and burgundy red permeated through the shows, while various animal prints in leopard, zebra, croc and snakeskin held strong in jackets, boots and bags.
At attention
Following on from SS26’s regency stylings in Napoleon jackets, epaulettes, frogging and longline trench coats, military-coded pieces and silhouettes are moving in on the mainstream. Google searches for the Napoleon Jacket have increased +485% YoY, reaching 51k+ searches in February 2026 alone. McQueen continued its foray into building on the regal trend so dominant of 2000s streetstyle, while Dior took its Napoleon learnings to its denim jeans, with sparkling embellishments reminiscent of hussar jacket closures.
Super base layer
It appears no coincidence with the Love Story hype and resurgence of the turtle-neck loving Carolyn Bessette Kennedy, that a large number of collections featured the polo, or turtle neck as the ultimate base for modern layers like chunky, belted knitwear, collared shirts and blazers. Scuba style at Loewe, 80s apres-ski at Issey Miyake, and sufficiently playing into the Poetcore trend at Dries Van Noten, Rabanne and Chloé, the turtle-neck might just be the hardest-working basic this season.
Bomber nostalgia
Outerwear is taking over as the key category for the fall winter season, with the bomber jacket getting its due. Whether from aviator origins, with high school or varsity track notes like Ann Demeulemeester and Dries Van Noten, or taking on the oversized ’80s-inspired leather iterations seen at Victoria Beckham and Gabriela Hearst, bombers added relaxation and effortlessness from Chanel to Stella McCartney. The silhouette also plays on the current Y2K nostalgia, with Google searches for “Y2K bomber jacket” rising 140% year-over-year in 2025.
The new peplum
Just when you thought peplums were sooo ‘business casual in the club’ to be left firmly in the 2010s, leave it to one man (and a handful of other designers) to make sure they couldn’t look more chic. The Dior runway opened with three looks, each sporting a shrunken peplum shaped jacket, with a scalloped tulle skirt beneath to emphasise the impact. The peplum shapes didn’t stop there; the Bar jacket renderings and waisted shirts kept the kicked-out silhouette fresh and ultimately very wearable. Elsewhere, Givenchy, AlainPaul and McQueen’s tightly nipped blazers offered relief in peplum pleats, while Alaia and Chanel took the shape right to the models feet.
All wrapped up
Bitter cold but make it fashion. This season the need for soothing warmth met big, bold wraps, capes and novelty-sized scarves. The enlarged tied scarf at Celine is sure to take off amongst the fashion set and influencers, while Issey Miyake, Carven and Dries Van Noten used belts to clamp down scarves, cloaks and capes for maximum security against the cold. Funnel necks and fur coats are key to the trends with plush fur coats seeing a +29% increase in market adoption, and funnel necks reaching a +875% rise in searches to last year, according to Trendalytics.
Ready to start assortment planning for next season? Here's how buyers and merchandisers can use data to boost results this season.
Image credits: Vogue Runway, Tagwalk, Grazia
