March 4, 2026 |
“I wanted it to feel very fresh,” said Dior’s Jonathan Anderson, who turned his show venue into a Parisian park promenade inspired by Seurat and Monet.
Anderson appeared relaxed backstage before the show as he explained how he’d broken free from a heritage formula shackled to past glories. Instead he foregrounded his own fascination with craft and fabrication – showing a clear way forward for Dior. “Less with the heaviness. Sometimes, you get very heavy in history. Yes, it’s Dior, and yes, it has this giant past. At the same time, it has to kind of release itself.” It made for a thrilling collection.
His show space signalled that desire to break with the past and create something fresh. Dior usually shows in a vast, box-like tent in the Tuileries gardens, but Anderson lifted the roof off to let the spring light pour in, and also give a glimpse of the tops of the Eiffel Tower, the Obelisk and the Grand Palais.
The designer constructed a promenade walkway over the garden’s famous fountain (he intends to reuse the set for different shows), which heaved with stylised waterlilies. “I was interested in the idea of pleasure gardens, of dressing up and the idea of going to a garden to be seen,” said the designer. “It’s quite nice to see clothing in daylight.” He broke out of the box in every sense with this collection, moving beyond the introduction phase of his tenure and firmly taking a grip on the house.
If his September debut was grounded in updates of archive pieces – the Bar jacket, Delft and Junon dresses – this sophomore collection used archive references lightly – the low swooping collar of grey peplum jacket had its roots in Mr Dior’s tailoring, a tiered embroidered skirt recalled the Junon petal dress, whilst the tiny silk covered lingerie buttons that followed the side seam on trousers owed a debt to John Galliano. The Bar jacket in Anderson’s new shrunken babydoll proportion came in cardigan versions, worn with scalloped tutu skirts – their edges picked out in silver sequins.
“This feels like where I want the thing to go. I’m allowing it to have time to get it there,” said the designer who lavished craft and hand-work onto every piece. Even jeans, worn with silk jacquard covered shearling jackets, were embroidered with wedding cake ribbons, sequins and crystals. “I’m very into the embroidered denim. It’s high/low but in a good way, because it’s taking a technique that is complex like ribbon work and then applying it to Japanese denim,” said Anderson. The abundant peplums, bows and frills had echoes of fashion history but they never felt nostalgic. Anderson said he’s not interested in retro. “I think you want to agitate against that.”
Instead he wanted to ground it in realness. “I quite like that it is fashion to be worn as a wardrobe. It’s a daywear wardrobe,” he said. But do not mistake that for anything ordinary. This was next-level ready-to-wear.
Highly crafted pieces are part of Anderson’s strategy to elevate Dior further and emphasise its rarefied couture house credentials. To this end, he has doubled the size of his atelier. Alongside Dior CEO Delphine Arnault, he says he is “trying to elevate the making process of everything.” He described it as “putting the hand back in.”
The designer explained that Dior had built special looms to make silk jacquard at a much broader width, “so you can get a bigger motif.” His came with a huge single flower motif swathed around the body in a sumptuous skirt.
Couture techniques were used liberally. The sumptuous flounces that burst from the hems of dresses and beneath shrunken Bar jackets were made from layers and layers of chiffon (“hundreds of metres of fabric”, explained the designer) which is beaded at the hem to create weight.
He described the shoes decorated with porcelain flowers as “pretty, pretty”, but overall look was feminine but not up-tight. “I like that they become undone,” he said of the bows that appeared to fall off the back of outfits.
His favourite piece was one of the most somber: a brown cashmere/mohair mix coat, its satin shawl collar reminiscent of a man’s dressing gown. “It’s masculine, sexual… It’s empowering, but there’s a classicism to it,” said the designer who vowed to revisit the look in his men’s collection. “It’s natural,” he said of the crossover of ideas and fabrics between the two.
He closed the show, not with a gown but a black version of his favourite coat (done in shearling ironed to look like astrakhan) adding, “A lot of people know Dior’s dresses, but he, for me, I think he did some of the, I’ve said this many times, but it was some of the greatest coats were done by Dior. “
Back in September, a remarkable image circulated of Anderson with tears in his eyes backstage at his debut show. “Last year was so intense,” he admits of the pressure of expectation that comes with his role. The difference between then and now? “I’ve relaxed into it,” he says. ”So, I think, in a weird way, as the shows go on, I feel a bit more free to do what I feel is needed in the brand.” He’s hitting his stride.
Photography by Christina Fragkou.
