Loewe – That Velvet Lady

McCollough and Hernandez Take Loewe: What Happens When Proenza Schouler Moves to Madrid

Erica — Mon, 27 Oct 2025 20:19:14 +0000

The Loewe new creative director announcement in spring 2025 was the kind of news that made the group chat explode before the press release even finished loading. Jonathan Anderson, the Northern Irish wunderkind who spent eleven years turning a quiet Spanish leather house into the loudest name in LVMH’s portfolio, was out. In his place: Jack McCollough and Lazaro Hernandez, the Parsons classmates who built Proenza Schouler into New York’s most quietly influential ready to wear label since Helmut Lang packed up. Two Americans. One Spanish heritage house founded in 1846. A Madrid atelier full of artisans who can hand stitch a Puzzle bag in their sleep. Everyone had opinions, and most of them were wrong.

Because here’s the thing about watching a creative director transition at a house like Loewe, the announcement is almost never the story. The story is what gets kept, what gets retired, and what gets reinvented in the first six months. Anderson left behind a very specific vocabulary: surrealist heels shaped like roses, tomato stem clutches, that viral trompe l’oeil denim, the whole “art school professor who somehow also dresses Zendaya” energy. McCollough and Hernandez do not speak that language. They speak a different one, breezier, more utilitarian, deeply Tribeca, and the SS26 debut at Paris Fashion Week was the first time anyone got to hear the accent. If you care about where luxury is heading in 2026, this is the transition to watch, and this is what actually changed.

Who Jack McCollough and Lazaro Hernandez Actually Are

Before the Loewe post Anderson era, McCollough and Hernandez were the guys who sold their entire Parsons senior thesis collection to Barneys New York in 2002, a story so fashion folklore at this point that it gets retold every September. They named the brand Proenza Schouler after their mothers’ maiden names and spent the next twenty three years building a label that the CFDA kept giving awards to and stylists kept putting on Michelle Obama, Chloe Sevigny, and basically every downtown woman with a Soho loft. Their aesthetic was never loud. It was the PS1 satchel with the fold over flap, the bias cut slip dress you could wear to a gallery opening, the boxy wool coat that looked like it cost three times what it actually did. Sharp, American, grown up, slightly intellectual. If Anderson’s Loewe was a Spanish surrealist painting, Proenza was a Donald Judd sculpture in a loft with good light.

Why LVMH Made the Call

When Anderson announced his exit in early 2025, he went to Dior Men, if you missed it, the shortlist of replacements read like a fantasy football draft. Instead, LVMH and Loewe CEO Pascale Lepoivre went with the duo who had never run a house this big, never worked under a conglomerate’s quarterly pressure, and had just stepped away from their own label in January 2025 to take the job. The logic, if you squint, makes sense. Loewe doesn’t need another conceptual genius right now, it needs someone who can translate Anderson’s cultural heat into consistent, sellable, everyday luxury. McCollough and Hernandez have spent two decades doing exactly that at Proenza, where “wearable” was never a dirty word. They are the Loewe new creative director pick for a house that wants to stop being a cult and start being a business.

The SS26 Debut: What Actually Walked

The Loewe SS26 show at Paris Fashion Week in October 2025 was the duo’s first full womenswear collection, and the reviews, WWD, W, Dazed, Who What Wear, landed somewhere between “relieved” and “surprised.” The palette was sunny and saturated: butter yellow, tomato red, washed denim, chalky pastels. There were logo embellished V neck sweaters layered over half buttoned poplin shirts with loafers, in a way one reviewer called “very after school” and meant as a compliment. The house’s heritage showed up as fringe trims, molded leather bodices, and a new Loewe towel dress shown in multiple iterations, a literal beach towel reworked into ready to wear, which is about the most Tribeca meets Madrid move imaginable. Critic Julie Gilhart, who bought the duo’s first Proenza collection in 2002, called it a “perfect 10.” The standing ovation, by all accounts, was not polite.

What’s Staying: The Bags That Built the House

Here is the question every Loewe customer actually wanted answered: do the bags change? The short answer is no, not yet, and probably not dramatically. The Puzzle bag, Anderson’s 2015 breakout design, the one that turned Loewe from a quiet leather house into a global obsession, is still front and center on loewe.com, with the small Featherlight Puzzle in nappa lambskin sitting at $4,800 and the mini at $3,850. The Flamenco clutch, which predates Anderson entirely and goes back to the house’s 1970s archive, still anchors the accessories wall at roughly $2,600 for the mini and $3,990 for the larger sizes. The Hammock, another Anderson era hit, remains in production, the compact version sits around $3,250, the Hammock Flip at $3,950. McCollough and Hernandez are smart enough not to kill the cash cows in year one. Expect evolution on hardware and colorways, not discontinuation.

What’s Quietly Getting Retired

What’s going away is harder to pin down but easy to feel. The surreal, high concept flourishes, the heels shaped like bars of soap, the tromp l’oeil t shirts, the runway props that looked like they were borrowed from a Venice Biennale installation, those were Anderson’s signature, and they’re not in the new vocabulary. SS26 had no gimmicks. The clothes stood on their own, which sounds like faint praise until you remember how many Anderson era pieces only made sense in the context of the show. Expect fewer viral “did you see this?” moments and more pieces you actually pull off the rail at Dover Street Market. That’s a trade some people will mourn and others will quietly celebrate while placing an order. For a broader read on how houses reset post icon, our luxury vs budget investment guide breaks down what actually holds value when creative direction changes.

What It Means for the Rest of Loewe Post Anderson

The real stakes go beyond the runway. Anderson turned Loewe into a $2 billion plus house built on cultural relevance, the Rihanna campaigns, the Paddington collab, the Squid Game moment. McCollough and Hernandez now inherit that machine and have to keep it humming without copying the previous sound. Early signs suggest they’ll lean into wearability, repeatable silhouettes, and the kind of customer who wants Loewe craftsmanship without the inside joke factor. If that sounds less exciting than Anderson’s pyrotechnics, remember that Proenza Schouler Loewe is, at its core, a business decision, and businesses this size need designers who can deliver four collections a year without creative burnout.

Do’s and Don’ts

Do	Don’t
Buy the Puzzle or Flamenco now if you’ve been waiting, they’re not going anywhere	Assume the entire Anderson era archive is about to get discounted
Watch the pre fall 2026 drop for the first real commercial test of the duo	Write off SS26 as “too safe” before you’ve seen the clothes in person
Look at Proenza Schouler’s back catalogue to understand their vocabulary	Expect trompe l’oeil surrealism or viral prop moments
Invest in the leather goods, still the house’s strongest category	Panic sell your Anderson era pieces on resale, values will hold
Follow the accessories team for subtle hardware changes	Confuse “approachable” with “boring” until FW26 lands
Read the full WWD and Dazed SS26 reviews for context	Rely only on Instagram carousel reactions
Track the Madrid atelier coverage, craftsmanship is the continuity story	Assume McCollough and Hernandez will abandon New York references
Compare SS26 to Proenza’s Spring 2024 minimalism show	Compare SS26 directly to Anderson’s greatest hits, it’s a different brief
Save your splurge for the towel dress if it makes production	Buy into every “end of an era” take, houses reset constantly
Keep an eye on the next campaign imagery for the new visual language	Expect everything to change at once; year one is always a transition

FAQs

Who is the Loewe new creative director after Jonathan Anderson? Jack McCollough and Lazaro Hernandez, the American duo who founded Proenza Schouler in 2002, were named co creative directors of Loewe in spring 2025. They officially took over in April 2025 and are responsible for all collections, womenswear, menswear, leather goods, and accessories. They remain minority shareholders and board members at Proenza Schouler but no longer design for that label.

When did Jonathan Anderson actually leave Loewe? Anderson exited in early 2025 after eleven years as creative director, during which he transformed Loewe from a quiet heritage house into one of LVMH’s biggest cultural engines. He moved to Dior Men shortly after, making his own debut at Paris Fashion Week later in the year. His final Loewe collection was the FW25 show in March 2025.

What was the Loewe SS26 debut collection like? The SS26 collection, shown at Paris Fashion Week in October 2025, was tactile, sunny, and considerably more wearable than late Anderson Loewe. The palette ran from butter yellow to tomato red to washed pastel. Standout pieces included a new Loewe towel dress, logo embellished V neck sweaters layered over poplin shirts, and intricately worked leather bodices that nodded to the house’s Madrid atelier roots. Reviews were strongly positive.

Are the Puzzle, Flamenco, and Hammock bags getting discontinued? No. All three remain in active production and are prominently featured on loewe.com as of 2026. The small Featherlight Puzzle retails around $4,800, the Flamenco mini clutch around $2,600, and the compact Hammock around $3,250. McCollough and Hernandez are expected to introduce new hardware, materials, and colorways over time rather than retire the core leather goods archive.

What makes McCollough and Hernandez different from Anderson stylistically? Anderson came from a conceptual, surrealist, art school professor school of design, his Loewe was full of references to sculpture, craft, and subversion. McCollough and Hernandez come from a New York minimalist tradition built on utility, clean tailoring, and sophisticated everyday dressing. Think Helmut Lang and Calvin Klein Collection rather than Comme des Garçons or Martin Margiela. The shift is from conceptual spectacle to wearable craft.

Is the Proenza Schouler brand still running? Yes, Proenza Schouler still exists as an independent company in New York. McCollough and Hernandez stepped away from designing for it in January 2025 to prepare for Loewe, but they remain minority shareholders and sit on the board. The house is continuing with a new design team, though at the time of writing the long term creative direction of Proenza Schouler has not been publicly announced.

Should I invest in Loewe pieces now or wait? For the heritage bags, Puzzle, Flamenco, Hammock, there’s no reason to wait. They’re not changing dramatically in the short term, and the craftsmanship that drives their resale value is being preserved. For ready to wear, the SS26 drop is worth watching in person before you commit, especially since the first pre fall and FW26 collections will give a clearer read on what the duo’s everyday Loewe actually looks like on the sales floor.

Where can I see the Loewe SS26 collection in full? The full SS26 runway video and lookbook are on loewe.com under the Stories section, and WWD, Dazed, W Magazine, and Who What Wear all published detailed reviews with runway photography. Paris based retailers and flagship Loewe boutiques in New York, London, and Madrid began stocking the collection in early 2026.

Conclusion

The Loewe new creative director transition is the most consequential house shake up of the year, and McCollough and Hernandez’s SS26 debut suggests the Proenza Schouler Loewe era will be quieter, more wearable, and more commercially sharp than Anderson’s. That’s not a downgrade, it’s a reset. If you’ve been circling a Puzzle or a Flamenco, now is a perfectly reasonable time. If you care about where luxury is heading, keep your eyes on Madrid.

Loewe Puzzle vs Mango vs Massimo Dutti: The Geometric Bag Battle

Erica — Fri, 05 Sep 2025 04:33:45 +0000

The Loewe Puzzle bag turned eleven this year, and somehow it still feels like the cleverest accessory in any room it walks into. Jonathan Anderson debuted it in spring 2015 as his first major design for the Madrid house, and the brief he set himself was almost annoyingly ambitious, deconstruct a conventional handbag, flatten it, then engineer it so it could fold into a clutch, sling across the body, or sit upright as a cuboid top handle. Every single one is still handmade in Madrid from seventy five pieces of leather over roughly nine hours. It is the rare It bag that has never stopped feeling intentional, and the rare luxury purchase that actually earns its price on a per wear basis. Which is also exactly why the hunt for a real Loewe Puzzle dupe has become a sport of its own on high street fashion floors this season.

Here is the uncomfortable truth, though. Most “puzzle inspired” bags you see online are just any small tan leather bag with a top handle, zero geometry, zero origami logic, zero understanding of what makes the original special. So I spent a week actually comparing three bags side by side on the desk and on the shoulder: the real Loewe Puzzle Small in classic calfskin (currently around $3,850 on loewe.com), Mango’s geometric mini bag from the Mango Selection leather line, and a Massimo Dutti faceted nappa shoulder bag from their current women’s bags floor. The goal wasn’t to crown a fake winner out of loyalty to the high street. It was to figure out which one, if any, actually delivers the geometric bag trend without embarrassing itself next to the original.

The Original: Why the Loewe Puzzle Still Sets the Rules

Before judging the lookalikes, you need to understand what you are actually paying for when you hand over close to three thousand dollars. The Loewe Puzzle is built from nine leather fragments cut with the precision of Japanese origami, stitched so cleanly that the corners look folded rather than sewn. The Small Puzzle measures roughly 24 x 16.5 x 10.5 cm, comes in classic, shiny, soft grained and satin calfskin, and has four wearing modes built into the hardware, shoulder bag, crossbody, top handle, folded clutch. The current Small retails around $3,850 and the Medium closer to $4,100 at loewe.com and 24S, with mini versions sitting slightly below. Resale on The RealReal and Fashionphile holds remarkably well for a bag this young, which is the cleanest sign it is a true modern classic and not just an It bag flash. If your budget can stretch, nothing below truly replaces it.

Mango’s Geometric Mini: The High Street Contender

Mango has quietly become the most serious high street destination for anyone who wants the Loewe Puzzle bag silhouette without the overdraft. Their current mini bag with geometric logo from the Mango Selection line uses real calf leather, sits at roughly 18 x 13 x 8 cm, and retails around $89 in the US (about £70 in the UK). The panelled front and boxed corners are the clearest nod to the Puzzle’s cuboid shape you will find under a hundred dollars. Mango’s leather quality has genuinely jumped in the last two seasons, the grain is tighter, the edges are painted rather than raw, and the lining feels closer to a Coach Tabby than anything from Zara TRF. It is not folded origami, the panels are simpler, more trapezoid than true cuboid, but from three feet away on a street style camera, it absolutely reads as a puzzle bag lookalike.

Massimo Dutti’s Faceted Nappa Shoulder Bag: The Grown Up Option

Massimo Dutti plays a different game. Their current faceted nappa leather shoulder bag sits around $179-$229 depending on colour and hardware, and the leather is genuinely closer to a mid tier luxury house like Polene or Strathberry than a fast fashion line. The faceted front panel catches light the way good nappa should, the strap attaches through properly recessed D rings rather than flimsy studs, and the interior lining is suede feel microfiber instead of nylon. Where it falls short of the Puzzle is shape logic, this is a softer, more rounded take on the geometric bag trend, less cuboid and more faceted envelope. But if you are over twenty eight, carry it to work, and do not want anything that even whispers “dupe,” the Massimo Dutti option is the one that will age the best. It also holds a phone, a small wallet, keys and sunglasses without the sausage casing effect the Mango suffers from when over packed.

Construction: Where the $3,700 Difference Actually Lives

Put all three on a table under a warm lamp and the gap between them becomes obvious in roughly ninety seconds. The Loewe Puzzle’s corners are sharp enough to draw a diagonal line on paper, because those panels are hand sewn in Madrid and hand painted on the edges so nothing puckers. The Massimo Dutti is the next cleanest, you can see machine topstitching but it is even, the edge paint is neat, and the leather has genuine temper to it. The Mango comes third, which is expected at its price: the topstitching wanders by a millimetre or two in a couple of spots, the corners are slightly soft rather than knife folded, and the edge paint is serviceable rather than beautiful. None of these is a deal breaker for the high street bag, but it is exactly where the 40x price difference lives. You are paying for hands, hours, and a Madrid atelier, not logo tax.

Styling the Geometric Bag Trend in Real Life

The best thing about the Loewe Puzzle bag silhouette is that it flatters almost every outfit because it introduces a hard shape against soft fabric. I styled each of the three with the same three looks, a cream knit with wide leg trousers, a slip dress with loafers, and an oversized blazer with straight leg denim. The Puzzle won across all three, but by a much smaller margin than the price tag suggests. The Massimo Dutti came closest on the tailoring looks because the nappa leather photographs richer than you expect. The Mango actually won the denim and blazer look, because the slightly smaller scale and high street ease felt right with casual weekend energy. For more mixed tier styling logic, see our luxury vs budget fashion guide.

The Verdict: Which Loewe Puzzle Dupe Actually Deserves Your Money

If you can comfortably afford the real Loewe Puzzle, buy the real Loewe Puzzle. Its resale value alone makes it the most honest luxury purchase on this list, and nothing about the construction has weakened over eleven years. If you cannot, the answer depends on what you want from the geometric bag trend. The Mango mini bag is the best true Loewe alternative under a hundred dollars, it gets the cuboid gesture, the tan leather, and the shoulder to crossbody styling for roughly 2% of the price. The Massimo Dutti faceted nappa bag is the smarter pick if you want something quietly beautiful that nobody will ever call a dupe, even though it reads slightly less “puzzle” and slightly more “soft architectural.” Buy the Mango for Instagram, the Massimo Dutti for work, and the Loewe for forever.

Do’s and Don’ts

Do	Don’t
Do treat the Loewe Puzzle as a ten year buy, not a season buy	Don’t buy any “puzzle dupe” that has zero visible panelling, it defeats the point
Do check edge paint quality before buying any leather bag under $200	Don’t assume Mango leather is still the same quality it was in 2019, it has improved a lot
Do size up to the Small Puzzle if you carry a phone plus sunglasses plus wallet	Don’t pack the Mango mini past capacity; the panels bulge
Do choose classic calfskin over shiny if you want the Puzzle to age gracefully	Don’t overlook Massimo Dutti just because it lives inside a Zara owned group
Do wear the Puzzle folded flat as a clutch for evening, it is literally built for it	Don’t believe every “Loewe Puzzle dupe” TikTok; most are generic tan bags
Do baby the corners on day one with a leather conditioner	Don’t store any of these three stuffed flat, use the dust bag and tissue
Do consider pre loved Puzzles from The RealReal if budget is the only barrier	Don’t buy faux leather versions of the Puzzle, the whole point is the craft
Do pair the geometric bag trend with soft tailoring for contrast	Don’t match hardware to shoe metal, it reads dated in 2026
Do photograph all three in daylight before deciding; artificial light flatters leather unfairly	Don’t confuse the Puzzle Edge with the original Puzzle, they wear very differently
Do buy the Mango mini in tan first, then branch to colour	Don’t sleep on Massimo Dutti’s bag drops; the nicest ones sell out quietly

FAQs

Is the Loewe Puzzle bag still worth buying in 2026? Yes, and arguably more than ever. Eleven years in, the Puzzle has settled into modern classic territory alongside the Fendi Baguette and Dior Saddle, with resale holding cleanly on platforms like The RealReal and Fashionphile. Jonathan Anderson’s structural logic, nine panels, origami corners, five wearing modes, still reads as current rather than dated, which cannot be said for most 2015 It bags. If you are the kind of buyer who wears one hero bag for a decade instead of rotating trends, the Small Puzzle in classic calfskin is one of the smartest luxury purchases currently on the shelf.

What is the closest true Loewe Puzzle dupe under $100? The Mango mini bag with geometric logo from the Mango Selection leather line is, genuinely, the closest. It uses real calf leather, has a clear panelled cuboid adjacent shape, sits around $89, and photographs convincingly on a shoulder. It is not a one to one copy because nothing at that price point can replicate handmade Madrid construction, but the silhouette is unmistakably in the Puzzle family. Avoid anything on Amazon marketed as a “puzzle bag lookalike”, most of those are generic tan totes with zero geometric panelling.

How does Massimo Dutti compare to Mango on leather quality? Massimo Dutti sits clearly above Mango on leather quality, and that is not a knock on Mango. The Dutti faceted nappa has a richer temper, better edge paint, and proper hardware recessing that feels closer to Polene or Strathberry than to high street. It costs roughly twice as much, around $179 to $229 versus Mango’s $89, and you can feel that extra spend in your hand. If you are styling for work or events where the bag is part of the outfit’s credibility, go Massimo Dutti. If it is a weekend trend piece, Mango is plenty.

Does the geometric bag trend have staying power beyond 2026? The geometric bag trend is actually less of a trend and more of a return to structured handbag design after a decade of slouchy hobos and puffy nylon. Runways at Bottega Veneta, Jil Sander and Loewe under Jonathan Anderson have all leaned into faceted, cuboid or architectural silhouettes for several consecutive seasons, and the high street is now catching up rather than leading. Expect to see the faceted and cuboid shapes continue through FW26 and into SS27, especially in tan, chocolate and clean black.

Can the Mango mini bag really be mistaken for a Loewe Puzzle from far away? From three to five feet away in natural light, yes, on a street style camera it absolutely reads puzzle adjacent, and most people will not clock the difference. Up close the panels are softer, the corners less knife folded, and the leather grain less refined, so it will not fool anyone leaning in. If your priority is “I want this silhouette in my outfit rotation” rather than “I want people to think I spent $3,850,” it is an honest to goodness win.

Is the Small or Mini Puzzle the better buy? For most women, the Small Puzzle is the right buy. The Mini is adorable but genuinely functional only for a phone and a lipstick, which makes it a second bag rather than a daily workhorse. The Small fits an iPhone Pro Max, a small cardholder wallet, keys, lipstick and sunglasses with room to fold flat into a clutch for evening, which is exactly the versatility Anderson designed the bag for. Unless you already own a daily tote and want the Puzzle purely as an occasion piece, size up to Small.

Where should I buy a pre loved Loewe Puzzle safely? The RealReal, Fashionphile and Vestiaire Collective are the three platforms with strong authentication teams and clean return policies. Resale on the Puzzle is unusually healthy, expect to pay roughly 60 to 75 percent of retail for a Small in good condition, with rare colours sometimes holding closer to 85 percent. Avoid general eBay listings unless the seller has verifiable provenance, because the Puzzle is one of the more faked luxury bags on secondary markets right now.

Will Jonathan Anderson leaving Loewe hurt the Puzzle’s value? Anderson stepped down from Loewe in 2025 and the house is now in a transition era, which has historically created a short term collector spike for pieces closely associated with the outgoing designer, think Phoebe Philo era Celine. The Puzzle, as Anderson’s very first Loewe design, is exactly the kind of piece that tends to hold or gain value in that scenario. If anything, this is a reason to buy sooner rather than later if it has been on your list.

Conclusion

The geometric bag trend is one of the few accessory stories in 2026 that genuinely scales across every budget tier, and the Loewe Puzzle is still the reference point everyone else is measuring against. Buy the real one if you can, the Massimo Dutti if you want quiet sophistication, and the Mango if you want the silhouette for under a hundred dollars without pretending it is something it is not. Three good answers, one great bag, zero wrong choices, which is exactly the kind of shopping problem worth having.

Jonathan Anderson at Dior: Reinventing the Bar Jacket for a Post Chiuri Era

Erica — Fri, 08 Aug 2025 03:46:06 +0000

There are appointments that feel inevitable and there are appointments that feel like a tectonic plate shifting under the industry. Jonathan Anderson Dior belongs firmly in the second category. When LVMH confirmed on June 2, 2025 that the Northern Irish designer behind JW Anderson and the most commercially electric decade Loewe has ever had would be taking the reins of Dior womenswear, menswear, and haute couture, the group was doing something it had not done in more than half a century, handing a single designer every creative lever at 30 Avenue Montaigne. It is the kind of consolidation of power that has not existed at Dior since Christian himself was alive, and it reframes what we can expect from the house for the rest of the decade.

The move landed just days after Maria Grazia Chiuri, who was announced as stepping down on May 29, 2025, closed her nine year chapter with a Cruise 2026 show in Rome. Chiuri arrived in 2016 as Dior’s first female artistic director and leaves behind a commercial juggernaut built on feminist slogan tees, Book Totes and a softened Bar Jacket. Anderson inherits a house that is, by most accounts, still growing but creatively overdue for a jolt. If you have been reading WWD, Vogue, Business of Fashion, or Women’s Wear Daily this past year, you already know the subtext, Dior needed a new language, and LVMH decided Anderson was the translator. This piece walks through what his SS26 debut actually said, what he is keeping from the Chiuri era, and what that tiny, insolent new Bar Jacket means for the rest of us.

From JW Anderson to Loewe to Dior: How He Got Here

Anderson is not a surprise hire, he is a logical conclusion. He launched JW Anderson in 2008 out of London and spent years cultivating a genderless, slightly perverse take on British tailoring that read as art school dispatches from a very expensive dinner party. In 2013, LVMH took a minority stake in JW Anderson and handed him Loewe, then a sleepy Spanish leather goods house with beautiful bones and zero buzz. Over eleven years he turned Loewe into a cultural phenomenon, the Puzzle bag, the Flamenco, the tomato clutch, the Taylor Swift and Aubrey Plaza red carpet moments, collaborations with Studio Ghibli and Suna Fujita. When he exited Loewe in March 2025, his final show sent out clothes that basically functioned as museum labels for an entire genre he had invented. That pedigree is why the Dior appointment felt less like a gamble and more like a promotion.

The Chiuri Exit: What Dior Is Leaving Behind

To understand the scale of the shift, it helps to name what is being retired. The Maria Grazia Chiuri exit closes a specific era, one that prioritized wearable tailoring, tulle skirts rooted in dance and folklore, the J’Adior slingback, the slogan T shirts that became museum pieces, and a commercial vocabulary pitched squarely at the modern, 30 plus Dior customer. Chiuri stabilized Dior after Raf Simons’ departure and tripled revenue by some estimates. But the critical conversation had cooled, reviews from Vogue Runway, WWD and BoF increasingly noted that the shows were beautiful but predictable, and that the house’s creative temperature was not matching its sales temperature. LVMH clearly decided that stability was no longer the priority. Anderson was brought in to do the one thing Chiuri was never really asked to do: make Dior feel dangerous again.

The SS26 Menswear Debut: A Recode, Not a Reset

Anderson’s first move as Dior new creative director came on June 27, 2025, with his SS26 men’s show, and it was deliberately quieter than anyone expected. Instead of fireworks, he sent out rumpled Irish Donegal tweed Bar Jackets (a wink to his own heritage), cargo shorts tailored like couture, pastel capes over bare legs, and white tank tops tucked into high waisted shorts that felt like a student at a Merchant Ivory film. The front row, Rihanna, A$AP Rocky, Roger Federer, Robert Pattinson, understood the assignment immediately. Critics at Hypebeast and WWD described it as a “recoding” of Dior’s vocabulary rather than a replacement. The Bar Jacket was there, but dishevelled. The tailoring was there, but subverted by a slightly off proportion. It was Anderson saying, in the politest possible way, that the house was now his museum and we were about to walk through it.

The SS26 Womenswear Debut: A New New Look

The real test came on October 1, 2025, when Anderson opened Paris Fashion Week with his first Dior SS26 womenswear collection, staged inside an inverted dystopian glass pyramid at the Tuileries designed in collaboration with filmmaker Luca Guadagnino. Jennifer Lawrence, Charlize Theron, Anya Taylor Joy, Jenna Ortega, and BLACKPINK’s Jisoo filled the front row. What Anderson sent out felt like a mashup, part 18th century pannier, part 1947 New Look, part 2010s Celine minimalism. The standing ovation at the end was not politeness. Vogue Scandinavia, Dazed, Who What Wear and Wallpaper all described the collection as the most consequential Dior debut since John Galliano’s in 1996. The headline piece, of course, was the Bar Jacket, and what he did to it is the single most discussed silhouette of the season.

Reinventing the Bar Jacket: The Headline Silhouette

The original 1947 Bar Jacket was Christian Dior’s revolution, a nipped waist, a padded hip, a skirt that swallowed fabric rations. Chiuri’s version was softer, slightly oversized, and built for real life. Anderson did something very different. He shrunk it. The SS26 Tailleur Bar suit arrived cropped to the ribcage, paired with a pleated micro mini skirt, styled with flat ballet slippers and socks. Another version scooped up at the front like a tied bow. A third appeared as a cutout, ribbon tied piece that looked half undone. Who What Wear called them “shrunken Bar Jackets”; Wallpaper called it a “sharp, contemporary” reframing. Anderson himself described it as a “new New Look.” The message is clear, the Bar Jacket is no longer a grown up uniform, it is an object of play, and that single decision repositions Dior for a Gen Z customer who was never going to buy a Chiuri era tulle skirt in the first place.

What He Is Keeping, What He Is Retiring

Anderson is too smart to scorch the earth. He is keeping the Book Tote (for now), the Saddle, the core small leather goods engine, and the reverence for the atelier that Chiuri built up over nine years. What he is quietly retiring is the slogan T shirt vocabulary, the Chiuri era tulle, the feminist manifesto staging, and, frankly, the safe silhouette. The Anderson Dior debut signals a return to the kind of high risk, high reward collection design that Dior has not done since Galliano. If Chiuri’s Dior was a museum with the lights on, Anderson’s is the same museum at night, with someone rearranging the labels.

Do’s and Don’ts

Do	Don’t
Buy into the cropped Bar Jacket silhouette if you want one piece from this era	Expect Chiuri era tulle and slogan tees to remain the house language
Watch the Dior SS26 delivery cycle for accessible entry pieces like small bags	Assume couture prices, expect the headline Bar Jackets to land at €4,500+
Style cropped blazers with micro pleated skirts, socks, and flats	Pair a shrunken Bar Jacket with 2010s skinny jeans, it kills the proportion
Use JW Anderson and late Loewe as styling references for Anderson’s Dior codes	Confuse this era with a “Dior revival”, it is a reinvention
Invest in core leather goods like the Lady Dior or Saddle, which Anderson is keeping	Panic sell your Chiuri era pieces; archive value is rising fast
Follow Vogue Runway, WWD and BoF for every Dior drop through 2026	Rely on Instagram re posts for accurate collection details
Look at Irish Donegal tweed and cargo tailoring as key menswear directions	Expect menswear to look like Kim Jones’ Dior Men, that era is closed
Save for one investment piece rather than chasing every trend reference	Buy a fast fashion shrunken blazer and call it a Bar Jacket, the cut is the whole point
Read Anderson’s interviews in AnOther and System for the clearest point of view	Trust AI generated runway recaps; the proportions matter and only close ups tell the truth
Treat the SS26 collection as the blueprint for Dior’s next three years	Assume this is a one season stunt, LVMH gave him full control for a reason

FAQs

When exactly did Jonathan Anderson join Dior? Anderson was first announced as the creative director of Dior Men on April 17, 2025. On June 2, 2025, LVMH expanded that role to include women’s ready to wear and haute couture, making him the first single designer to hold all three positions at Dior since Christian Dior himself. His first menswear show landed on June 27, 2025, and his womenswear debut opened Paris Fashion Week on October 1, 2025.

What happened to Maria Grazia Chiuri? Chiuri’s exit was confirmed by Dior on May 29, 2025, ending a nine year run that began in 2016 when she became the house’s first female artistic director. Her final collection was the Cruise 2026 show in Rome, which she presented just days before the announcement. She has not yet confirmed her next move, though industry watchers expect a return to Italian houses or a project of her own.

Is Jonathan Anderson still running JW Anderson? Yes, he stepped back from day to day Loewe duties in March 2025 but JW Anderson, his namesake label, remains active, though on a pared back schedule. LVMH has historically allowed designers to keep their own labels running alongside house appointments (see Kim Jones and Dior Men). Expect JW Anderson to continue as a creative lab, not a commercial priority.

What is different about Anderson’s Bar Jacket? The Anderson Bar Jacket is cropped to the ribcage, paired with a pleated mini skirt, and styled with flats rather than heels. Some versions scoop up at the front like a bow, others are cut with ribbon ties and cutouts. Critics at Who What Wear and Wallpaper have described it as a “new New Look”, a deliberate reproportioning of Dior’s 1947 original for a younger customer.

Where can I actually buy pieces from the Dior SS26 collection? The SS26 women’s collection began delivering to Dior flagships and dior.com in late January 2026. Expect the shrunken Bar Jackets to sit in the €4,000-€6,500 range, micro pleated skirts around €1,800, and the new logoed heels near €950. Waitlists for runway looks are already weeks deep at the Avenue Montaigne flagship and Harrods.

Is this appointment good for Dior commercially? LVMH does not release Dior specific figures, but analysts at BoF and Reuters have noted that Dior’s growth had plateaued in late 2024 as the broader luxury market cooled. Anderson’s arrival is both a creative and a commercial reset, the goal is to re excite the younger customer and recapture editorial mindshare, which is why LVMH handed him total control rather than splitting the role.

How does this change Paris Fashion Week as a whole? Dramatically. Anderson’s Dior now goes head to head with Pharrell at Louis Vuitton, Matthieu Blazy’s new Chanel, and Sarah Burton’s Givenchy in a reshuffled Paris Fashion Week schedule that looks nothing like it did two years ago. For editors and buyers, SS26 was the first season in memory where every major LVMH and Kering house debuted a new creative director within six months of each other.

Is the new Bar Jacket actually wearable in real life? That is the question, and the honest answer is, with the right proportions, yes. The cropped blazer pair with a mini skirt formula is already bleeding into Zara TRF, Mango Selection and Aritzia Babaton deliveries, and styling it with flats and socks is the current editorial shorthand. If you are investing in the real thing, book a fitting and try it with both high waisted tailored shorts and a pleated mini, the jacket reads very differently on each. For the high street version, see our guide on how to look expensive on a budget.

Conclusion

The Jonathan Anderson Dior era is not a rebrand, it is a reinvention, and the shrunken Bar Jacket is the manifesto pinned to the front door. Chiuri built a stable, commercial, beloved Dior; Anderson is being asked to build the next cultural one. Whether you buy into it, archive your Chiuri era pieces, or just watch from the sidelines, this is the story the rest of luxury fashion will be reacting to for the next three years. Save this piece, come back after the FW26 show, and let’s see how far the recoding goes.

Loewe – That Velvet Lady

McCollough and Hernandez Take Loewe: What Happens When Proenza Schouler Moves to Madrid

Who Jack McCollough and Lazaro Hernandez Actually Are

Why LVMH Made the Call

The SS26 Debut: What Actually Walked

What’s Staying: The Bags That Built the House

What’s Quietly Getting Retired

What It Means for the Rest of Loewe Post Anderson

Do’s and Don’ts

FAQs

Conclusion

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Construction: Where the $3,700 Difference Actually Lives

Styling the Geometric Bag Trend in Real Life

The Verdict: Which Loewe Puzzle Dupe Actually Deserves Your Money

Do’s and Don’ts

FAQs

Conclusion

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Jonathan Anderson at Dior: Reinventing the Bar Jacket for a Post Chiuri Era

From JW Anderson to Loewe to Dior: How He Got Here

The Chiuri Exit: What Dior Is Leaving Behind

The SS26 Menswear Debut: A Recode, Not a Reset

The SS26 Womenswear Debut: A New New Look

Reinventing the Bar Jacket: The Headline Silhouette

What He Is Keeping, What He Is Retiring

Do’s and Don’ts

FAQs

Conclusion

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