Since the announcement of Pierpaolo Piccioli‘s appointment as Balenciaga‘s creative director in May, following Demna’s departure, his debut for the house has been one of the most hotly anticipated shows of the season. Taking place last night at the brand’s headquarters in Paris’ 7th arrondissement, an A-List attendees included Anne Hathaway, Rachel Sennott, Meghan Markle, FKA Twigs, and Simone Ashley. Each guest was greeted with a letter from Piccoli on their seats upon arrival, opening with the lines, “The heartbeat is the rhythm we share—the pulse that reminds us we are human. Even so, every heart beats differently. In commonality lies individuality: what defines us also connects us, what is universal in presence becomes personal in expression… This collection exists because we recognised, saw, and welcomed one another.”

Aptly titled The Heartbeat, the invite received by guests included a cassette tape which played a thumping heartbeat, setting the scene for a collection charged with love. This season, the former Valentino creative director turned to the maison’s founder, Cristóbal Balenciaga. Boasting close to a century’s worth of history, taking the helm of a brand with a heritage as strong as this one is no small feat. Tackling the archive head-on, Piccoli focused on recalibrating traditional principles for today, bridging the past with the present and looking to the future. Within the show space, a makeshift Parisian salon was scented with Getaria, the Balenciaga fragrance named after the birthplace of Cristobal Balenciaga, giving guests a new olfactory memory of the signature scent. 

The methodology of the house’s craft formed the core of Piccoli’s offering, focusing on “a weightlessness, clothes conceived for and around a dynamic body.” The 1960s cocoon silhouettes and 1950s sack dresses were reimagined, imbuing garments with an ease and lightness as they hit the runway, while the Gazar fabric introduced by Cristobal Balenciaga in 1958 was reinvented with a newer, softer sensibility. The bug-eyed shades nodded to Demna’s tenure, while the brand’s BB logo, first invented for the house’s relaunch as a ready-to-wear brand in the 1980s, featured across bags and belt buckles. Instead of being merely decorative, embellishment transformed garments’ volumes as sculpted petals bloomed from dresses or leather outerwear and tuffed fabric sprouted from skirts.

Intricately feathered skirts were paired with opera gloves snaking up the arms and hi-low silhouettes of ultra-cropped tops and sweeping trousers or skirts left midriffs on display. The collection also offered up a series of highly wearable looks featuring denim jeans, leather bombers, bermuda shorts, tailored suit trousers and enveloping car coats. As the final look of Piccoli’s debut disappeared behind the curtain, Lauryn Hill’s rendition of Can’t Take My Eyes Off Of You bellowed through the speakers, and the sentiment rang true as all eyes were on Piccoli, taking his bow to a round of applause.