Schiaparelli Fall 2026 Couture
Could artificial intelligence ever create haute couture? For Schiaparelli creative director Daniel Roseberry, the answer lies not in rejecting technology, but in exploring what remains uniquely human about the craft of making clothes.
Opening Paris Couture Week, the Fall 2026 Couture collection examined the relationship between digital innovation and traditional couture techniques, bringing together handmade craftsmanship with unexpected materials including latex, silicone, dried flowers, seashells and fish scales.
Known for pushing the boundaries between fashion and art, Roseberry approached the collection as a response to a changing creative landscape. While the designer remains committed to drawing every look by hand, he acknowledged the growing influence of AI within the next generation of designers — and used the collection to explore the tension between human imagination and computer-generated possibilities.
The result was a series of dramatic silhouettes that blurred the line between the natural and artificial. Inflatable latex tentacles extended from jackets, molded silicone bustiers created new interpretations of the body, and gowns incorporated lighting effects that brought movement and technology into the couture process.
The collection continued Schiaparelli’s tradition of surrealism, where the familiar is transformed into something unexpected. Corsets, jackets and dresses were reshaped through exaggerated volumes and unusual textures, creating garments that felt part fashion, part sculpture.
Roseberry’s references extended beyond technology, drawing inspiration from the unsettling imagery of artist Matthew Barney’s Cremaster Cycle and the house’s own history of experimentation. The designer looked back to founder Elsa Schiaparelli’s relationship with surrealism, humour and the unconventional, continuing a legacy built around challenging traditional ideas of beauty.
The craftsmanship behind the collection remained central. Working with specialist Parisian workshops, Roseberry explored techniques more commonly associated with film and special effects, including highly realistic silicone work, bringing together the worlds of costume, technology and couture.
Despite its futuristic elements, the collection ultimately returned to a familiar question: what makes fashion human? In a moment when images, designs and even creative processes can increasingly be generated digitally, Schiaparelli’s Fall 2026 Couture collection positioned craftsmanship, imagination and the designer’s hand as the elements that cannot be replicated.
For Roseberry, couture remains a space where experimentation has no limits — a place where beauty can be strange, challenging and unexpected.
