Selkie’s Latest Fantasy Is a Pirate Circus at the End of the World

Whereas most designers are displaying their Spring 2027 collections throughout New York Vogue Week in September, Selkie, the 8-year-old womenswear model from Kimberley Gordon, caught with its runway-to-retail methodology once more this season. Titled “The Ghost Ship,” the Fall 2026 assortment is available to shop now and shows a “darker, extra surreal evolution of the romantic fantasy,” per present notes.

The present introduced a touring pirate circus with “warrior women” dwelling off the grid (full with retro music gadgets) within the aftermath of an imagined apocalypse, per present notes. They’re haunted by the previous and not sure of what lies forward. Rebellious circus performers flip to creativity and pleasure as acts of survival. (Plus, an impressively versatile performer opened and closed the present.)

The gathering brings maritime folklore, historic fantasy and circus imagery into Selkie’s hyperfeminine world. Pirate and harlequin motifs seem alongside armor, corsetry, romantic attire and theatrical silhouettes. Chainmail, spiritual jewellery, seashells and outsized equipment give the model’s regular fantasy a darker edge.

Selkie Fall 2026. Picture: The Second Dep

Gordon was impressed by Cheryl Strayed’s “The Ghost Ship That Didn’t Carry Us,” a 2011 Expensive Sugar recommendation column later collected in her e book, “Tiny Stunning Issues.”

“It’s about selection in the long run. It’s about not regretting something that you just’ve chosen in your life,” Gordon instructed Fashionista after the present on Monday. “[In the essay, Strayed] talks about how we’ll by no means know of the life that we don’t select. It’s form of like two ships passing and there’s nothing you are able to do however wave to it from the shore.”

Gordon pointed to selections she’s made prior to now and the net response to them. “I’ve made some controversial ones and I’ve regretted a few of them,” she mentioned. “And whenever you’re on social media, you get a variety of issues, like being referred to as a clown, that it’s all a circus, like ‘what a clown present.’ And I believed, ‘why not placed on the final word clown present then and embrace the idiot?'”

She needed the present to have an “apocalyptic feeling” as a result of “of the zeitgeist proper now.” “There’s a variety of dialogue in regards to the world ending and lots of people stay in terror of this and I don’t stay in terror of that,” Gordon added. The designer additionally pulled inspiration from the Emily St. John Mandel novel, “Station Eleven” (and subsequent TV collection), which follows performers persevering with to be artistic on the finish of the world.

“Even in an apocalypse, even on the finish of the world, creativity and love survive and they’re the foundations of all issues which are essential,” Gordon mentioned. “And we’ve got a lot concern, however we don’t should be afraid when we’ve got creativity. [For] these performers, it’s an act of service to place out artwork and to carry out.”

“All life’s a stage and to be performative — what does that even imply?” the designer continued. “As a result of we’re all acting on a relentless foundation. And so I believed, ‘what a few present about performing?'”