The latest menswear season arrived with a refreshing shift in mood: deliberate nostalgia, sartorial confidence and a renewed appetite for texture, colour and personality. From Paris to Milan, designers served up collections that were rooted in the past while moving into the future.
Backtrack tailoring
If there was one thread that stitched the fall 2026 season together, it was a wholehearted embrace of the recent past. Designers reached back to the 1970s and 1980s with affection, conjuring a kind of louche, wide-lapelled masculinity that felt more at ease in a sunlit piazza than a corporate boardroom.
At Louis Vuitton, Pharrell Williams tapped into 1980s nostalgia through classic suits, tailored coats and suiting fabrics in houndstooth, herringbone and check, modernised with cropped leather jackets and a palette that mixed warm tones with pale pastels.
At Dolce & Gabbana, the retro dial moved between the early 2000s and the 1970s in its Portrait of Man collection. The designers revisited the velvet blazer and ripped denim combinations that had ruled the red carpet while reviving their signature Black Sicily codes with flat caps, pinstripe suits and polka dots on a rich burgundy ground.
Ivy League off-duty
“Preppy” has long been a menswear constant, but this season it was messier and more athletic. The Fall 2026 shows offered a version of the Ivy League wardrobe that paired preppy staples with athleisurewear, including blazers layered over hoodies, polo shirts tucked into jeans, and Oxford shirts paired with tracksuit tops.
Ralph Lauren’s show combined Polo and Purple Label on one runway, moving between “relaxed alpine resort” and “off-duty student”: rugby shirts with baggy trousers, sky-blue button-ups, heritage tweeds with ties, and contrasting sweaters.
At Gucci, creative director Demna Gvasalia’s pre-fall Generation Gucci collection had a Y2K-filtered take on sporty ease, pairing close-fitting T-shirts with wide trousers and blazers styled with jeans and mask sunglasses.
Fem twist
One of the season’s most radical moves was the steady drift of feminine codes into menswear. Silk and jacquard replaced hardier fabrics, embroidery appeared along cuffs and hems and necklines — low-V, scooped or gently draped — introduced a new kind of ease.
At Louis Vuitton, Williams introduced femininity through softer, considered details as silver crystals dusted an ice-blue shirt and a grey-check bomber. Elsewhere, coats were tied at the neck in a pussy-bow effect, their masculinity offset by soft pastels and feminine finishes.
Knit happens
Knitwear had a landmark season. The designs doing the most interesting work were those that leant into print through geometric patterns in contrasting colours and intricate alpine motifs. Construction was equally adventurous, with knits cropped and layered at the waist or worn as standalone centrepieces.
Paul Smith’s Fall 2026 show offered one of the season’s most charming contributions to the knit story, with alpaca reimaginings of archival Fair Isle designs, often styled as oversized scarves. At Zegna, what appeared to be classic pied-de-poule or tweed patterns on knitwear turned out to be graphic motifs woven in cashmere and recycled paper jacquard. Padded cashmere cardigans and shearling bombers with layered collars gave knitted pieces a strong outerwear presence.
From the June issue of Wanted, 2026.
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