Overview

• Duran Lantink, appointed in April, ended the five-year rotating couture model with his first RTW show for the house at Paris Fashion Week.
• SS26, titled Junior, reworked Gaultier codes with cone-bra riffs, 3D tattoo-on-mesh, hairy trompe-l’oeil bodysuits, inflated volumes and optical illusions.
• The show unfolded in the basement of the Musée du Quai Branly, drawing on Amsterdam’s RoXY club and John Giorno’s Dial-a-Poem for its nightlife mood.
• Lantink said he avoided the archives to build a personal “fantasy” of the brand through his hands-on “Duranification” process of making and fitting.
• Industry figures praised the daring, Gaultier-aligned energy as founder Jean Paul Gaultier embraced Lantink post-show, while online critics panned some looks as vulgar.