Dior to skip next Paris couture July season, as Maison Margiela and Iris van Herpen return

The house of Dior will sit out the next Paris couture catwalk season in July, even as Maison Margiela and Iris van Herpen return to the runways in the French capital, according to a provisional calendar released Monday.

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The decision by Dior is not unexpected, since the house only announced the appointment of new creative director Jonathan Anderson for menswear, womenswear, and haute couture earlier on Monday. Anderson will, however, make his runway debut for Dior this month, with a menswear runway show on the afternoon of June 27.

Balenciaga will present the final collection by its departing creative director, Demna of Georgia, in July. His successor, Pierpaolo Piccioli, will stage his first show for Balenciaga during the Paris women’s ready-to-wear season this fall.

The next couture season will take place from Monday, July 7, to Thursday, July 10. It will kick off with a show by one of Paris’ most legendary houses, Schiaparelli, and climax with a show by Rami Al Ali, a critically admired Syrian-born couturier. Known for his fresh take on classical couture gowns, Al Ali has dressed many stars and celebrities, including Beyoncé, Jennifer Lopez, Amal Clooney, Helen Mirren, Naomi Campbell, and Sharon Stone.

All told, there are 25 couturiers listed on the haute couture calendar, including Chanel and Giorgio Armani, who will both stage two shows apiece. This will mark the last show staged by Chanel where no designer will take a bow, since the collection, like the last five presented by Chanel, will be designed by an in-house studio team. Chanel’s new creative director, Matthieu Blazy, will make his debut in October during the next women’s ready-to-wear season in Paris.

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Though the season’s most keenly anticipated debut will be Glenn Martens, who succeeds John Galliano at Maison Margiela—a tricky act to follow, seeing as the UK designer’s January 2024 show under a bridge on the Seine was the single best couture show in Paris this decade.

The season will also welcome back French couturier Adeline André and two guest houses, ArdAzAei and Robert Wun, according to a new calendar released by the Fédération de la Haute Couture et de la Mode, French fashion’s governing body.

Separately, the Fédération noted that two Paris fashion houses will stage runway shows on the eve of couture: Celine at 2:30 p.m. and Patou at 5 p.m. on Sunday, July 6.

Despite the flurry of no-shows, studio-designed collections, and a clientele of fewer than 5,000 women, Paris haute couture remains the supreme example of creativity in fashion—the great laboratory de la mode. A busy week where the boulevards of the City of Light will be crammed with limousines ferrying the richest women in the world to the most reserved fashion shows on the planet.