After the spectacle of Spring 2026 in Madrid, Wes Gordon the spectacle of spring in Madridbrought the Carolina Herrera fall 2026 collection back to New York, and what emerged felt like a correction rather than a continuation. While the Spanish capital demanded grandeur and sweeping gowns, the runway in Gordon’s hometown on February 12th demanded something else entirely: clarity.
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| 👔 Brand: Carolina Herrera 🗓 Season: Fall 2026 👩🎨 Creative Director: Wes Gordon 🎨 Casting: Real New York artists, including Amy Sherald and Ming Smith, walked the runway. 🏙️ Location: Show held in New York on February 12, marking a return from Madrid. 👗 Silhouette Focus: Pragmatic separates replace grand evening gowns. 🌸 Motifs: Animal prints, calla lilies and Good Girl-inspired pump sketches. ✨ Evening Shift: Sequined knit sets and cocktail dresses dominate. 🖤 Hero Look: Fringed paillette tie-neck jacket paired with black denim. 🧵 Creative Direction: Wes Gordon emphasizes urban versatility over spectacle. |
Gordon enlisted real New York womenreal New York women to wear the clothes. Painter Amy Sherald walked the runway. So did Ming Smith, the first African-American female photographer whose work was added to the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art. Rachel Feinstein and Hannah Traore, both fixtures of the city’s creative landscape, appeared as well. These weren’t models pretending to be artists. They were artists. Period.
When pressed about his starting point, Gordon pointed to Peggy Guggenheim. The art collector and patron, who left New York for Venice decades ago, apparently influenced his vision of how creative women dress. Yet nothing obvious surfaced. There were no batwing sunglasses or dramatic capes. Instead, Gordon focused on separates that could build a working wardrobe rather than fill a ball gown closet.
Fitted jackets with puffed shoulders and calla lily buttons nodded to the founder of the house during her earlier years. Gordon paired them with asymmetric pencil skirts for the runway, but he admitted that he expects customers to wear them with jeans and heels. This pragmatism ran through the entire show.
Animal motifs appeared throughout, though Gordon never specified which creatures inspired the prints. Calla lilies, those architectural flowers with undeniable sensuality, adorned the garments. Pencil sketches of stiletto pumps appeared on button-downs, pencil skirts, and dresses with distinct 1980s proportions. The pump design was inspired by the bottle of Good Girl, the brand’s best-selling fragrance since its launch in 2016.
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The Good Girl bottle, shaped like a high-heeled shoe, has become one of the most recognizable fragrance bottles in recent years. Translating that three-dimensional form into a flat sketch on silk required technical precision. Gordon succeeded without veering into kitsch.
Occasion dressing remains crucial to the business, but Gordon shifted his focus elsewhere for fall. Those seeking a gown will need to revisit the Madrid collection from Spring 2026. Here, cocktail dresses and party frocks dominated the evening category. Sequined knit separates offered the comfort of sweaters with enough sparkle for evening wear.
The most striking look was a tie-neck jacket with fringed paillettes, worn over black denim trousers. Eliza Douglas, an artist who spent years working with Demna at Balenciaga, modeled the outfit. The jacket glittered. The jeans grounded it. Together, they suggested a new kind of evening uniform that defies the formal versus casual binary.
Three generations of Herreras sat in the audience, reminding us that Gordon designs for a house with deep roots and exacting standards. Yet, he continues to push the brand toward bolder self-expression. This collection didn’t reject the polite-society past. Gordon simply proposed that elegance might look different now.
His decision to cast artists instead of professional models reinforced that shift. These women brought their own presence to the clothes. They moved differently. They held themselves with the confidence that comes from building careers outside the fashion system. Gordon dressed them as New Yorkers: women whose wardrobes need to work hard across multiple contexts.
After Madrid’s theatrical production in Plaza Mayor, this approach felt deliberately restrained. Gordon returned to his home turf and remembered what matters here. Not drama for its own sake, but clothes that hold up under daily scrutiny. Separates you can rework. Jacquards that catch the light without announcing themselves. Sequins that don’t require an occasion.
