Colleen Allen joined the 2026 class of LVMH Prize semifinalists this week, an honor that will surely bring global awareness to her brooding brand of soft mysticism. “It’s been a goal of mine from the beginning, so to be acknowledged like that feels really affirming,” she said during a fall collection preview.
For two years, Allen has been quietly staking her claim in the Gothic romantic look and it seems both fashion and pop culture are now catching up. “Wuthering Heights” hit the box-office last week, fueling the fire — in other words, this is Allen’s moment.
So it’s only natural that she would push the limits of her ingenuity, and to help her do that, Allen enlisted the French-American artist Louise Bourgeois. Known for her large-scale spider sculptures, Bourgeois led Allen to consider space and its relationship to the body in different ways. “I think I’m craving space, the physical space to be creative, and questioning how to protect it,” she said.
Allen’s answer came in part from an image of a seated 90-year-old Bourgeois practically drowning in blankets. It materialized in her collection as fleece and wrinkled velvet gowns with large swaths of fabric, creating shawls or hoods, great for those wintertime events when getting off the couch seems like an impossible task. Elsewhere, lace tops cut from a single piece caressed the body in equally seductive ways, while a sequined off-the-shoulder version was torn to expose it. A vintage collector, Allen pointed out this design was based on an 18th-century bodice, explaining how important it was for her to honor the decay from the character who originally inhabited it.
Similarly, Bourgeois saw the beauty in well-worn garments as well, often recycling her father’s shirts to make art. Allen paid homage to that practice — and those spiders — by patch-working striped cotton into one with a weblike puzzle. The same material was also used to remarkable effect in a bustle-back dress with equally complicated seam lines, this time neatly matching up at every point. “It’s a crazy tailoring moment,” joked Allen.
What makes her a strong LVMH contender isn’t just her spellbinding vision, but the fact that she has the technical know-how to keep you entranced.
