For SS23, Maria Grazia Chiuri’s typically tribute-paying Dior catwalk found itself enamoured by royalty. An investigation into Catherine De Medici was the show’s focal point, Chiuri herself enamoured and awestruck by the Italian noblewoman’s innovative spirit and political mind. Medici was quite the pioneer of mid-16th century dress, giving us the heeled shoe, Burano lace and the corset, so as an industry it seems we have quite a lot to thank her for.

Save for a flurry of florals decorating wide pant legs and ruffled skirts, Chiuri’s use of colour in the collection was sparse, restricted to hues of beige and black. Lacy basque corsetry dominated in these ranks, supported by royal court-like wide panier skirts, sliced mini and knee-length, structured bulbous and round, or rigidly tiered, many clad in ornate, gold-specked embroidery. It’s these delicate flourishes that imprint Chiuri’s distinct DNA on such classics, merging flowy night shirts with vests and jeans, floral prints and airy patchwork skirts, it’s a classic sense of modernity she craves, intent on bleeding the past into the present.

The show ended with two performers, Irme and Marne van Opstal, creeping slowly down the runway, body entwining around body, their feet inching cautiously behind them. Perhaps it was a metaphor for the symbiosis of divinity and female power, perhaps just a stirring bit of choreography. Whatever the designer’s intent, the ensuing air of the mystic was as clear as day.