Camiel Fortgens returned to Amsterdam Fashion Week with SS26, staged not on a runway but in the middle of Bilderdijkpark. The choice was fitting: clothes that live best in motion, among people, trees and stray dogs; a nod to his most recent endeavour during Paris Fashion Week, where he took to the streets of Paris rather than the runway to connect clothing to the environment and the people.
The Amsterdam-based designer has built a language of unpolished refinement, where imperfection is handled with the precision of tailoring. This season, he turned his attention to archetypal American classics, twisting familiar vintage shapes into pieces that carried a laid-back luxury. Think denim with rough edges, sportswear with attitude, and suiting that refused to behave too neatly.
Guests arrived like park visitors, finding a spot on the grass, chatting in the late-summer sun. Without any announcement, the models entered and walked among the guests. Models drifted in casually with props as mundane as umbrellas, dogs, oranges, and bikes. They looked less like they were on duty and more like they’d wandered into the park fully dressed in Fortgens. Each carried a portable speaker playing fragments of a larger soundtrack, layering the park with sound until the finale pulled it all together in one unified piece of music.
The collection moved fluidly between womenswear and menswear, styled with rain boots, loafers, and white socks. Bags came with holes punched clean through, while denim met butter-yellow cotton, navy was spiked with bright red, and striped polos added an American vintage note alongside long shorts. Monochrome looks cut through the palette, like an all-white top-and-skirt set paired with round-toe black shoes, accessorised with navy bags and an iPhone, as if caught mid-errand. Alongside the main collection, pieces from the SS26 research line appeared deliberately unfinished, fragments of process left visible to show experimentation in motion rather than a final, polished product.
SS26 was about proximity to the city, to daily life, to clothes that breathe and shift as easily as their wearers. Once again, Fortgens positioned fashion grounded in everyday wear, craftsmanship, and a personal vision that is at once poetic and precise.
Words by Inês Lopes
