What happens when avant-garde meets “add to cart”? In 2026, it looks like Zara securing John Galliano for a two-year run, just another Tuesday. Luxury has developed a curious soft spot for the mass market, the headline-grabbing one-offs are basically tradition at this point. Jonathan Anderson might be a private guy, but his long-term situationship with Uniqlo is quite hard to miss. And sometimes, it’s not a detour, it’s the destination. Take it from Francesco Risso, who went from Marni to GU’s $30 racks. If anything, this feels intentional.
It’s been almost two years now since Galliano’s Margiela dolls walked his last show. Since then, he’s been touching grass, literally. He explained it like “walking through the woods without my phone, getting lost but not being afraid to get lost, and relying on instinct again, reconnecting with instinct, like breathing correctly,” to a little bird that turns at the name Vogue. That same bird also reports that “he’s been secretly working in an atelier ‘somewhere around Paris’ since January.”
How would a creative start, you ask? With the beloved archival deep-dive. Lucky him, Zara’s personal time capsule of previous hits (and misses), is roughly 50 years worth of déjà vu. “I’m super excited, because it’s not something I’ve done before, so that kind of tickles me—the newness, the excitement, the actual process,” he told Vogue. Well, one thing’s certain, September sees wallets loosened and checkout buttons abused. The crowd is ready.
