Spring 2026 Haute Couture: Celia Kritharioti’s Old Hollywood

For her first presentation on the official Haute Couture calendar, Celia Kritharioti returned to Old Hollywood glamour—not as reinvention, but as foundation. The Greek couturière staged Spring 2026 as a cinematic premiere, drawing on an era when glamour was built with intention and meant to be seen.

The Golden Age of Hollywood didn't merely dress women—it staged them. Both couture and cinema built their reputations on the same promise: the ability to transform a woman into something grander.

Black velvet curtains framed the entrance while expanses of white chiffon billowed overhead—a contrast between the drama of a stage and the hushed focus of an atelier. On the runway, the collection unfolded in a series of glamorous tableaux. Feathers appeared in cut fringes, lace densely incrusted with florals, crystals tracing the body in deliberate chains, organza rosettes blooming across bodices. The emphasis was unmistakably on craft—work produced by the house's own petite mains in Athens, complemented by collaborations with established Parisian ateliers like Maison Lemarié and Maison Lesage.

Volume dominated. Dresses in taffeta, silk satin, and organza ballooned outward as though held aloft by air rather than structure. Tulle and chiffon silhouettes were crowned with elongated, translucent veils that drifted behind the models like shimmering smoke. Elsewhere, column gowns sculpted close to the body introduced sharper lines, occasionally interrupted by cut-outs. The final bridal look closed the show: a monumental white tulle ballgown, entirely overlaid with embroidered floral lace appliqués.

This debut on couture's central stage introduced Kritharioti's vision—one rooted in traditional savoir-faire, carried forward by the legacy of Greece's oldest couture house, founded in 1906.