Final night time (7 March 2026), Pierpaolo Piccioli introduced ‘ClairObscur’, his second assortment for Balenciaga, and a collaboration with Sam Levinson, creator of HBO Unique’s multi award-winning teen drama Euphoria.
The collaboration performed out throughout screens at a present house on Avenue Champs-Elysées, which featured preview clips from the sequence’ third season, which is able to air to the general public in mid-April. In attendance for the A/W 2026 occasion had been stars from HBO’s catalogue, together with Rachel Sennott (I Love LA) and Hudson Williams (Heated Rivalry). ‘The set up and experiential house symbolize a refraction and reflection of rules central to Levinson and Piccioli – of fact, compassion, affinity and above all humanity,’ an announcement from Balenciaga detailed.
Balenciaga’s Euphoria collaboration
The gathering was ‘a seek for the stress between darkness and light-weight’
(Picture credit score: Alessandro Galatoli)
Euphoria – which catapulted its forged, together with the likes of Jacob Elordi, Sydney Sweeney, and Hunter Schafer to fame when it first aired in 2019 – is understood for its putting visible fashion. Its second sequence was shot fully on 35mm movie, and its mundane setting of a nondescript American highschool is elevated by way of distinctive lighting which provides to the present’s emotional realism. Particularly, its dreamy high quality is conveyed by way of using saturated colored gentle.
Appropriately then, ClairObscur took its essence from ‘a seek for the stress between darkness and light-weight’, which in excessive artwork is also referred to as clair-obscur or chiaroscuro, and tends to manifest as dramatically contrasting tones to create intense depth.
Balenciaga A/W 2026 runway
(Picture credit score: Alessandro Galatoli)
Piccioli described the rationale behind his selection of Levinson as inventive companion, as being for his ‘capability to convey a way of our realities, by way of a prismatic illustration of human fragilities and strengths. This present is a means of weaving tales collectively, leaving house to think about a mess of potentialities. It’s about at all times discovering the sunshine within the darkness.’ He additionally praised Levinson for his abilities in being about to ‘see with out judgement… there isn’t any vainness in his strategy,’ Piccioli mentioned.
On the collaboration and its themes, Levinson commented that: ‘With out Obscur, the Clair could be flat and blinding; and with out the Clair, the Obscur would swallow every thing into darkness. I believe Euphoria has at all times been about characters trying to find that steadiness of sunshine and darkish, searching for the concord that exists inside and the marvel of being alive’.
Piccioli was introduced to guide the home based in 1919 by Spanish couturier Cristóbal Balenciaga, in Might of final 12 months, following the departure of Demna Gvasalia to Gucci after ten years as inventive director. The Italian designer had beforehand been on the helm of Valentino, since 2008, the place he was recognized for his experiments in color and quantity.
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