Christian Cowan Fall 2026
Christian Cowan has always understood spectacle. His runways have often felt like a night out — loud, sparkling, and unapologetically excessive. But for Fall 2026, the designer invited us somewhere quieter, somewhere more intimate. Presented at 8 p.m. on a Friday night, his collection titled Before the Door Opens traded the club for the dressing room mirror, reimagining glamour not as performance but as preparation.
“I love period cinema,” he said backstage, “and I wanted to evoke that older feeling, that moment before someone steps onstage.” The result was a cinematic meditation on transformation, built from lace slips, garters and negligees that looked discovered on an old Hollywood soundstage - garments caught between abandon and elegance. Many were literally reimagined relics: Cowan sourced vintage pieces from the 1920s through the 1950s, repurposing silks and lingerie from Hollywood’s golden age into something modern and strange. The fabric, he noted, was thinner, more porous, “so we played with gel, with texture, with how it clings to the body.”
The palette stayed mostly nocturnal, black, navy, and deep maroon, punctuated by the occasional flicker of crystal or silver. The silhouettes, too, carried a newfound restraint. A Marlene Dietrich-inspired suit with a funnel-neck coat and faux fur trim exuded composure, while a red silk swing jacket paired only with garter tights suggested the moment before composure slips. And then came the theatre: bat-wing gowns referencing Diana Ross in Mahogany, their backs cut low to reveal what Cowan calls “butt cleavage,” a phrase he defends with unapologetic delight.
For a designer so associated with flash, this quieter sensuality felt like evolution. The collection had wit and provocation, but it was grounded in craft, in the way a fabric folds or clings, in the ritual of getting ready. There was nostalgia, but not sentimentality. Cowan’s show reminded us that glamour isn’t only found under the spotlight; often, it begins in the moments before the door opens.
