Fendi teams with Marc Newson on quilt inspired runway set for SS26 show in Milan
FENDI’s centenary year becomes a stage where heritage and innovation coexist through the creative dialogue of Silvia Venturini Fendi and Marc Newson.
Their collaboration for the Spring/Summer 2026 collection is not just an intersection of fashion and design, but a layered narrative where memory, materiality, and modernity intertwine.
Newson’s concept for the set transforms a runway into a landscape of color and tactility, weaving together both tradition and digital abstraction in a way that extends FENDI’s legacy while positioning it firmly within a forward-looking discourse.
The connection between FENDI and Marc Newson carries a rich history, recalling their first collaboration during Milan Design Week in 2000.
Back then, his Ford O21C Concept Car launch featured playful FENDI details, such as fur-inspired dice, that subtly honored the maison’s atelier origins. Two and a half decades later, this reunion elevates that dialogue into a symbolic gesture.
By situating his new design within the language of FENDI’s craftsmanship, Newson emphasizes how artistry and invention become collective experiences, resonating with the values that have defined the house across generations.
At the core of the concept lies an exploration of color as an immersive medium. Marc Newson expands the floral patterns of FENDI’s SS26 collection into a reimagined environment, creating geometric fields that recall both quilting traditions and pixelated forms.
This duality expresses continuity: quilts as repositories of storytelling and intergenerational care, pixels as signifiers of digital evolution and cultural progress.
The interplay between handcraft and modern technology reflects FENDI’s ongoing mission to preserve artisanal values while embracing the vitality of contemporary expression.
The set becomes a navigable composition, a flowing terrain of hues and textures that dissolve spatial boundaries between audience and collection. It is not designed as static scenery but as an evolving encounter, where light, surface, and form converge to heighten the experience of the garments themselves. By abstracting floral origins into digital patchworks, the environment assumes a quilt-like resonance while simultaneously recalling early experiments in colored television, signaling movement from tradition to innovation.
In this sense, Marc Newson’s design aligns seamlessly with Silvia Venturini Fendi’s vision of dual narratives—preserving heritage while encouraging playful reinterpretation. The runway transforms into an artistic dialogue: a quilt of memory, a screen of color, and a continuum of craftsmanship. The atmosphere celebrates Karl Lagerfeld’s historic influence on FENDI while opening a space for new creative trajectories. It is a homage and a progression, a simultaneous acknowledgment of legacy and momentum.
All images courtesy of Marc Newson, shared with permission
Interested in publishing your work?
If you are interested in having your work featured on Visual Atelier 8, please visit our Submission page. Once approved, your work will be presented to our global audience of professionals and enthusiasts.
