“Lonesome Heaven” is the title of Ann Demeulemeester’s Spring/Summer collection, designed by Stefano Gallici, who has served as the brand’s creative director since 2023. Here, as in previous collections, one thing is clear: Gallici is a victim of his own making. Above all, he is a victim of haste and the need to prove that he has fully grasped a language that is as precise as it is difficult to inherit. His work stems from a clear understanding of Ann Demeulemeester’s universe, its codes, and the tensions that have made it recognizable over time, but he seems to want to showcase them all at once, without giving them the space they need to carry real weight.
Ann has developed her own design language through a series of contrasts: the precision of tailoring juxtaposed with the fluidity of fabric, masculine rigor set against the vulnerability of the body, leather and silk, structure and movement, protection and surrender. The jackets have a clean, structured construction, while ribbons, laces, threads, and fabrics follow the body’s contours, allowing it to emerge. Asymmetry, deconstruction, layering, and that particular notion of romanticism that runs through her work take on meaning precisely because they are held in balance. In “Lonesome Heaven,” all these elements come to the forefront: romantically cut shirts with high collars unfurl into endless strands and are paired with cropped black jackets in a Napoleonic cut; leather trench coats meet sheer silks; ruffles and fringes are layered, details accumulate, and hook-and-eye closures at the ankles are paired with structured blazers. These are all elements that belong to Ann’s vocabulary, but their concentration ultimately transforms a complex language into a repertoire of instantly recognizable symbols.
For Gallici, the challenge seems to lie less in understanding the code than in gauging it. Because the key to Ann’s fashion—as well as that of the particular Belgian school to which she belongs—is precisely the ability to let things remain in tension without resolving them, without filling every space. There is a silent bubbling in her fashion that lives beneath the surface, both marvelous and fragile. The strength comes from subtraction, from proportions, from the movement of a fabric, from the presence of a body that remains partly exposed and partly protected. Poetry, too—so central to her work—enters the garment through this deeper dimension: not as a quotation or decoration, but as a way of conceiving the body, identity, and matter.
When all the codes are brought to the forefront at once, the reflection that should run through the collection is stifled by their very prominence, and the surface takes precedence over depth. Ann’s renowned “darkness” stems precisely from here—from this depth, which is anything but Gothic. Black is introspection, austerity, a delving into the depths, an inward turn; it possesses a spiritual dimension and a Calvinist severity that keep it far removed from any purely aesthetic notion of darkness. Similarly, femininity remains androgynous, suspended between the masculine and the feminine, while sensuality emerges through the body’s vulnerability and through what the garment protects rather than fully exposes. This vulnerability is absent in *Lonesome Heaven*. The desire to make the codes visible, to multiply their presence, and to emphasize their rebellious nature ultimately absorbs the most intimate aspect of Ann’s artistic exploration.
Some of the details are particularly interesting, such as the “dirty” effect on the pants and silk cummerbunds, deliberately streaked with white, like rust stains exposed to the sun. The same technique is used on the blazers, taking on a very interesting textural quality that gives the surface a sense of wear and transformation. The more understated suits are also beautiful—the perfectly fitted jackets, the very high collars—all those moments when the construction of the garment speaks for itself without needing any further embellishment. These are perhaps the moments when one most clearly senses just how compelling Gallici’s work could be—when the reference to Ann ceases to be a mere sum of codes and returns to being a guiding principle.
Unfortunately, the work as a whole remains too overloaded. Gallici is familiar with the language he has inherited and fully understands its conventions; what is still missing is the ability to be selective, to allow an element time to settle, and to let the body once again become the focus of reflection.
[📸 Getty Images]
