This season, Marie Lueder invited us to a convivium, the Latin word for a banquet or feast. Smashed wine glasses, some still with the dregs of red wine, lined the runway. At the end stood a long banquet table which the models climbed onto and used as their catwalk. Traditionally, Lueder presents her new collections at Berlin Fashion Week, as a catwalk, and then at London Fashion Week, as a presentation. This season, we got full catwalk Lueder. Speaking to the designer backstage after the show, she told us that she wanted her London show to be more cohesive this season: “The idea was cohesion and having everyone be like one group of friends around the dinner table.”

The collection itself took its main cinematic inspiration from Baz Luhrman’s Romeo + Juliet: “I was rewatching [Romeo + Juliet] with my friend and we were talking about our favourite parts,” the designer continues. “And I was thinking about the carnival in that film, which then led me to look at medieval carnivals and that idea of the world being upside down. That was the main thing I was really excited about showing.” 

The concept of medieval carnivals makes total sense in Lueder’s world. The collection featured curled-toe goblin shoes, hooded capelets, and plenty of drawstrings. There were also recycled football kits that went through a sherring process, woollen scarves that incorporated hoods, and new slogan t-shirts that read “Beats are Back” and “Unraveling”. 

For those familiar with Lueder’s previous collections, it was something of a surprise to see how relatively pared back and wearable her SS26 was. This was exactly the designer’s intention. “I wanted it to be wearable for everyone and, ideally, also accessible. To partner up with Pull & Bear was nice because now all my friends can buy it and that’s really cool. It was really nice to work in a way where it’s more accessible and working with that as a regimen, but still making it interesting and nice.”