A few days earlier than internet hosting a walkthrough of his pre-fall 2026 assortment, Han Chong previewed a brief movie in a packed-out dumpling restaurant in Chinatown. “Sandiwara,” written and directed by Sean Baker and starring Michelle Yeoh, shaped a part of Self-Portrait’s ongoing Residency program, which launched with a Christopher Kane capsule in 2024, and can proceed to increase into collaborations throughout different artistic disciplines. Why? “There’s an excessive amount of noise, an excessive amount of style in the meanwhile,” the designer stated. “Individuals are overwhelmed.” It was onerous to disagree. By the point we met at Self-Portrait’s headquarters in Farringdon, style month had already been rumbling on for the higher a part of 8 weeks, with the autumn 2026 season having technically begun at Pitti Uomo in January. Little surprise, then, that Chong selected to drag it again this season. “It felt proper to not over-design,” he stated.
Wouldn’t it be taboo to confess that it got here as one thing of a reduction to examine a rack of garments with no agenda past “being simple for the shopper to know”? Let’s hope not. Taking away your artistic ego and catering to precise consumers—quite than, say, critics or journal editorials—is noble in its personal approach. (And you may say Demna did a lot the identical at his debut Gucci present.) In Self-Portrait’s world that translated to coordinated skirt units of broderie anglaise, pale-pink knits with floral button detailing, and lace-trimmed bouclé fits. In the meantime denim—arguably probably the most simple material of all—was engineered into cowl-neck minidresses with completely flared skirts, twisted-seam cargo trousers, and halterneck button-up maxi clothes. It was elsewhere handled till it draped nearly like cashmere, showing in pussy-bow blouses and wide-leg denims embroidered with a silver pinstripe thread. Altogether the temper felt sweeter, a contact extra coquettish than final season. “Effectively,” Chong shrugged. “we’re heading into summer time and clients will need to really feel gentle.”
Certainly, pre-fall—Chong’s greatest season—will retail till early September, masking the interval during which his shoppers’ calendars fill with bachelorette events, weddings and summer time holidays. Therefore the emphasis once in a while put on: lavishly draped ribbed-jersey robes, uneven cotton poplin shirt clothes, bow-topped shifts, and diamanté-strewn cocktail numbers starting from backless columns to ruched minis. There was even a taffeta bridal robe. And who higher an endorsement for Chong’s celebration ladies than Kate Moss? “Oh my God, your bias-cut clothes,” he recalled her saying of an extended model of the polka-dot slip featured right here. “They match so nicely and look wonderful.” It’s by coincidence, actually, that the mannequin’s Balearic uniform was evoked in crochet seashore clothes and basket baggage, alongside vintage-y nightgowns, linen waistcoats and lace blouses of the type she’s lengthy been identified to seek out alongside Portobello Street. Chong received’t say whether or not she’ll be the following topic of his Residency.
