In 1971, Manolo Blahnik created shoes for the designer Ossie Clark's catwalk show in London. Relatively new to shoemaking, the Spanish designer forgot to put steel pins in the heels of the shoes, which meant that models wobbled, unbalanced, down the catwalk.
Regardless of the address, the revered fashion designer always, unabashedly, combined old with new, shedding fresh light on various historical design movements and their most important pioneers. Most of these homes have been the subject of expansive magazine print features and the fodder of tabloid headlines but little focus has ever really been placed on his workspaces.
There's Portugal, Brittany, Vendée, Egypt, and Damascus. He also has a place in Los Angeles. And there's Vermelho Melides, the boutique hotel in Portugal, that he designed and opened in 2023, and its new beachside mate, scheduled to be ready this summer.
It's long had a reputation as the city of romance, but now the French capital is supporting a growing number of businesses that will arrange an extravagant marriage proposal in a landmark setting - for a hefty fee, of course. The luxury marriage proposal business is booming in Paris with agencies charging international clients thousands of euros to pop the question in a 'romantic' setting in the City of Love.
Fifteen years after the death of Lee McQueen, the brand is struggling to maintain momentum. The founder is a hallowed name in the fashion industry, and one of the few modern designers to whose character and story the wider public feel a connection. But the generation who wore McQueen's original bumsters have aged out of shock-value fashion, and the name has less power over younger consumers.
The dress, conversely, is 80 years old, and it isn't his. It's by Pierre Balmain - Tron shows me a René Gruau illustration of the look where, with a platter hat, white fox stole and opera-length gloves, the look is borne back ceaselessly into the past. It's an illustration in a book titled The New French Style, of Balmain outfits with an essay by Alice B Toklas, the partner of Gertrude Stein.
An approach to fabric, to the body, to craft and to women. Not in that order. Pieter Mulier, a softly-spoken, warm-eyed Belgian, has led Alaïa for just shy of five years. This season, it was his time to say goodbye.
That space wasn't some lavish backdrop to Saint Laurent's entertaining but, rather, a living, breathing collaborator in his creative enterprises. Yves Saint Laurent gets a Matisse, then makes a Matisse dress; Bergé buys Goya's 1791 Portrait de Luis María de Cistué y Martínez, and Saint Laurent translates that baby Spanish aristocrat's pink sash to a bowed 1983 evening gown.
In 1994, when the grunge aesthetic gripped the nation (chokers, combat boots), the make-up artist Heidi Morawetz created Le Vernis Rouge Noir. There and then, backstage at Chanel's Autumn/Winter ready to wear show, she mixed black and reds until the shade emerged - a perfect blend of rebellion and conformity; not too black, not too red, not too bold, and not too boring.
People have a lot of ideas of what Chanel is, or rather what it should be. One word that doesn't come up much, though, is rebellious - yet that's exactly what Chanel the woman was and what Chanel the house remains. Rather than rebellion, 'paradox' was the word used by Matthieu Blazy, Chanel's artistic director of fashion collections, backstage after his debut show for the maison in October.
Speaking backstage before the show, Anderson, dressed in his signature faded Levi's jeans and a navy cashmere sweater, described the collection as another character study, explaining that this time he set out to explore the idea of a new aristocracy, questioning what it means today and what can it be? The-41-year old designer said when it came to the social hierarchy he wanted to ignore the aspect of money and instead home in on their eccentricity.
The streets of Paris were buzzing last week with anticipation as the city hosted the Men's Fall/Winter 2026/2027 Paris Fashion Week. From the stately avenues near the Palais Brongniart to the futuristic installations of Fondation Louis Vuitton, the French capital transformed into a stage for sartorial reinvention. Designers challenged conventional silhouettes, explored bold materials, and redefined what modern menswear could be. Observers left with a sense that the era of predictable tailoring has shifted toward experimentation-balancing structure, fluidity, and wearability.
As a travel writer who refuses to check a bag, I've had to distill my travel wardrobe down to 10 versatile staples that can easily mix and match to create over a dozen outfits. Whether I'm wine-bar hopping in the trendy 11th arrondissement, playing tourist by the Eiffel Tower, or splurging on a fancy dinner in Saint-Germain-des-Prés, I need pieces that can be dressed up or down-and crucially, that will keep me warm.
Embroidery is a historic mainstay of traditional clothing in Asia or the Middle East, as well as Western Haute Couture, but it is increasingly present in Paris, Milan or New York on modern men's shirts, bomber jackets or blazers. Designers at Dior, Dolce Gabbana, Kenzo or Gucci have adopted it in recent runway shows, while Louis Vuitton's celebrity rapper-designer Pharell Williams dedicated his entire June collection to India after visiting the country.
Instead of the long, insulated puffer coats and jeans I saw on the subway, I was sporting a wool overcoat and leather pants-I instantly stood out. The same goes for many tourists visiting Paris who dress much warmer than necessary (thankfully, we never have serious winter storm warnings here like the recent one in the U.S.) or make fashion faux pas like trying to navigate the city's winding streets teetering in talons hauts (high heels).
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