Fresh from winning the LVMH Prize, Belgian designer Julie Kegels makes a compelling case for her brand of femininity at Paris Fashion Week. Presenting her latest Spring/Summer 2027 collection, “Apple of the Day”, she translated the pressure and awkwardness of sudden success into clothes, seemingly pulled down by gravity.
Moving beyond predictable seasonal muses and nostalgic fashion references, Kegels centred her collection around the act of falling. While the title and the inspiration evoke Newton’s apple, she does not use gravity as a scientific concept but rather as a metaphor for the weight of everyday life.
This framework translated directly into the looks, where the clothes were not merely distorted but seemed to respond to an invisible force. Across the collection, waistlines sagged, and proportions were deformed. Kegels turned the experience of being pulled in multiple directions into silhouettes.
Kegels took the most familiar elements of a modern wardrobe and then gently collapsed them. A dress was cropped at the bust, disrupting continuity. Similar deconstructions appeared in denim jackets, pleated tops, and beige dresses and tights.
The most literal expression of her idea of gravity was seen in the bottoms. Extremely drooping tights that looked almost harem-style, and denims and trousers with sagging waistlines looked like the wearer had been caught in the act of dressing or undressing.
The colour palette was largely browns and beiges with flashes of turquoise, blue, and even soft green, rendering a freshness to the collection. Free-flowing fabrics like organza led the collection’s material makeup, making the silhouettes clean and in motion. These stylistic choices made her collection feel particularly light, even when it was centred around the idea of weight.
Rather than a display of certainty that might have seemed superficial, Kegels acknowledges the uncertainty the sudden success puts her in, finding elegance in the moments just before everything falls into place. The collection felt honest, sincere, and relatable to anyone arriving at a career-defining moment.
