A new year has risen and so has Dior. Ever since Jonathan Anderson took the helm, we have watched a tactical dismantling of the French house codes – most notably in a debut defined by Adam Curtis-induced dread and the high-concept shock of shoving Dior’s “terrifying” history into a box. The new Spring/Summer 2026 campaign, shot by David Sims, is the moment we see that history finally unpacked, evolving into a vision that reworks the archives without freezing them in time.
There is a beautiful, patrician boredom to the setting. Within rooms heavy with creaky parquet and Louis XVI settees, Anderson’s Dior clique loiters with a curated nonchalance. Greta Lee, now a fully-fledged ambassador, is caught in the unglamorous, intimate act of testing a slingback – a tribute to the archival, Roger Vivier-infused footwear being revitalised by design director Nina Christen.
While Louis Garrel and Paul Kircher add a distinctly cinematic undercurrent, the clothes themselves reveal a designer obsessed with archival cannibalism. Anderson has taken the mid-century structural genius of the 1948 ‘Delft’ dress and aggressively abbreviated it into the stiff, deep-pleated cargo shorts worn by Kircher.
Having previously teased the collection’s arrival, Kylian Mbappé is captured lounging beneath a 1928 Paul Strecker portrait of Christian Dior, effortlessly transitioning from a casual navy knit to a sharp tuxedo. Alongside them, Laura Kaiser, Sunday Rose and Saar Mansvelt Beck move between roles with a neophyte energy, as if dressing is a process they are still figuring out in real time.
The setting does its part without becoming decorative. Boiserie walls and carefully chosen furniture hint at aristocratic interiors, but there is nothing precious about them; these are spaces that feel inhabited and slightly imperfect. Sims shoots in both colour and black-and-white, allowing a turned shoulder or a slumped posture to carry the narrative. The Bar jacket returns once again, but it no longer behaves like a museum piece. Instead, it sits comfortably alongside easy denim and piped shirting, creating a wardrobe that plays with formality rather than obeying it.
Even the accessories have been granted a sort of sentient temper. The Lady Dior bag, usually the ultimate symbol of poised perfection, has been subjected to a beautiful bit of textile vandalism by artist Sheila Hicks, who has smothered it in a frantic, tactile explosion of red tassels.
It is joined by the Dior Cigale, with its dainty, bowed nod to the 1952 archives and the ‘Crunchy’ bags, which add a surrealist, squishy counterpoint to the disciplined tailoring. And last but not least, the now iconic Book Totes embroidered with the covers of gothic classics like ‘Dracula,’ suggesting a Dior woman who is as well-read as she is rebellious.
Discover more here.
photography. courtesy of David Sims
words. Gennaro Costanzo
