ALAINPAUL Spring/Summer 2027 at Paris Fashion Week

ALAINPAUL Spring/Summer 2027 / SS27 at Paris Fashion Week entitled THE SCENE

A dancer may exit the stage, but movement never leaves the body. For SS27 / Spring/Summer 2027, ALAINPAUL follows a performer beyond the velvet curtains, carrying traces of the stage deep into the night. The codified choreography loosens, and the distinction between the institutional and the underground begins to blur. Dance becomes an instinctive language of the body, as embodied in the practices of choreographers Hofesh Shechter, (LA)HORDE and Sharon Eyal, whose work draws from the energy of nightlife and informs this collection. The performer leaves for the scene, and the scene’s freedom finds its way back onto the stage, where one wardrobe contaminates another.

Characters dress in the moments after the performance, in what can be grabbed from the dressing room. Rehearsal tights are wrapped around the torso as a top, worn with tailored stirrup trousers. A dress is pulled down and folded at the waist into a skirt. Tailoring continues ALAINPAUL’s established vocabulary, with the forward shoulder projected further through an elastic construction at the back of single-breasted jackets and coats, pulling against the front to sharpen the waist. A new reversed-peak lapel introduces another code, while an oversized tailored skirt with multiple button positions and an internal elastic system lets the wearer determine the waist and the fall of the wool.

The nylon tracksuit becomes an exercise in elevation. Drawcords, pullers and elastics migrate onto pencil skirts, sleeveless tops and dresses, while women’s track jackets take on balloon sleeves with the presence of eveningwear. The dialogue extends into material, where transparent, dry silk is constructed to resemble nylon, while lightweight nylon takes on the fluidity of silk. In the flou pieces, light mousseline dresses and gowns with integrated tunnels, cords and stoppers place the drape in the hands of the wearer, so that pulling or releasing the fabric transforms the silhouette. A pink satin slip dress carries a print drawn from the messages and signatures dancers write on worn pointe shoes, deliberately blurred and smeared, its satin pleated and crushed as if already worn through the night.

ALAINPAUL’s 2025 collaboration for the Paris Opera with Imre and Marne Van Opstal revealed that a stage costume is built only for the audience’s view. The principle enters the collection as trompe-l’œil fragments: a shirt reduced to its front, a tank or cardigan stripped back to its visible surface, an ornamental plastron appearing as jewellery. Pieces resemble elements left behind after a performance, carrying the memory of a costume without reproducing it in full. Historical references surface in jacquards, épaulettes, pannier volumes and theatrical brooches, their original context displaced into contemporary dress.

Denim is treated individually through distressing, bleaching and metallic foil, so that the collective silhouette is made of individual identities. Leather draws from utilitarian clothing, turning function into adornment. Pockets migrate onto pencil skirts, while the leather knee pad, originally conceived as protection for the dancer’s body, is detached from its function and transformed into an accessory that can be worn on the leg or carried as a bag. Similarly, a tailored sleeve can be tied as a top, cummerbund or even a bag. Knitwear moves from the rehearsal studio’s cache-cœur to hand-knitted wool justaucorps, warm-up shorts and cardigans. In footwear, ballerinas, including a stiletto version, are joined by a derby distorted along its side, referencing the imprint that years of pointe work leave on the foot.

The language of the stage becomes increasingly abstract towards the end of the collection. The tutu is reduced to its essential construction and transformed into a gown of “a thousand ruffles,” each individually applied, appearing to float around the body while an internal corset supports it. The final look reverses the logic, using metal-thread woven silk organza to hold its gesture in space with almost no weight, anchored by a single grosgrain band at the chest.

For SS27 / Spring/Summer 2027, ALAINPAUL extends the collection’s investigation of movement into its presentation. For the first time, a live performance brings together contemporary dance and the pulse of underground nightlife. The choreography begins with individual bodies and gradually gathers into a larger group, moving from separation towards a shared physical language. Developed with choreographer Eric Christison, the performance is set to a score by sound designer Senjan Jansen in collaboration with Shygirl, amplifying ALAINPAUL’s dialogue between stage and scene.