Check out the five new high-fashion exhibitions, soon to open, this year

2026 is shaping up to be a landmark year for high fashion, with major museums opening massive new wings and staging retrospectives for some of history's most radical designers.

The V&A is finally giving Elsa Schiaparelli — the woman who made a hat look like a shoe — her first major UK retrospective. Guess what's on display: the legendary Skeleton and Tears dresses (collaborations with Salvador Dalí) and how the current creative director, Daniel Roseberry, is keeping that bizarre, gilded magic alive today. V&A South Kensington, London. March 28 – November 8, 2026.

Instead of focusing on a single designer, this exhibition focuses on the drama of the runway. It traces the evolution from 19th-century private salons to Alexander McQueen’s theatrical spectacles and Fendi’s show on the Great Wall of China. It’s a deep dive into the architecture, music and lighting that make a collection legendary. V&A Dundee, Scotland. April 3, 2026 – January 17, 2027

Paris is leaning into The Masters Dialogue, a two-part event split between the Fondation Azzedine Alaïa and La Galerie Dior. For decades, Azzedine Alaïa was a legendary secret collector. He quietly amassed over 20,000 pieces of fashion history, including 600 original Christian Dior designs. This exhibition marks one of the first times the public can see the depth of his Dior archive. Curated by the brilliant Olivier Saillard, the show at the Fondation (the designer’s former home and studio in the Marais) features 70 looks—35 from each master. Till May 24, 2026. Fondation Azzedine Alaïa, Paris.

A dual-site exhibition focusing on Saint Laurent’s obsession with nature and flowers. Hosted simultaneously in his former Paris atelier and the stunning Marrakech museum, this collection of his flower-women gowns (lilies, roses and wheat) presented on herbarium boards to highlight the botanical precision of his embroidery. Musée YSL (Paris & Marrakech). Simultaneous Dates in 2026.

Curated by Dr Elizabeth Way, this show tackles the age-old question: Is fashion art ?It pairs 140 pieces from the FIT archives, tracing connections from 18th-century Rococo to postmodernism. Direct comparisons between designers like Issey Miyake and Hussein Chalayan with fine artists like Salvador Dalí and Picasso. The Museum at FIT, New York. February 18 – April 19, 2026.

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