Zimmermann’s Fall 2026 Collection With a Sharper, 1920s-Inspired Edge

Nicky Zimmermann presented her fall 2026 collection, titled Trailblazer, at Le Carreau du Temple during Paris Fashion Week in March, with the line reaching boutiques and zimmermann.com from July. The designer drew on Australian women of the 1920s who pushed into roles closed to them, including her own grandmother, who trained as a lifesaver at a time when women weren’t permitted to hold the job. Oprah Winfrey, Jessica Chastain, Naomi Watts, Lily James, and Leila George filled the front row.

Zimmermann spent time at the Australian Museum working through black-and-white photographs of women who defied convention in the 1920s. “My grandmother was a lifesaver at Coogee Beach in her late teens,” she has said. “Her stories of that time always captivated me.” Kathleen Howell and Jean Robertson drove across the country together, sitting on the back of a car and lighting each other’s cigarettes along the way. Miles Franklin wrote My Brilliant Career, a novel that became a foundational feminist text and gave the collection part of its name. Zimmermann has said she took her cues from the era’s risk-taking, its unfussy practicality and its humour.

Zimmermann’s Valiant pieces lean hardest into the lingerie-as-outerwear idea that has defined recent seasons, with lace blazers, corseted bodices, and a standout lingerie gown in dark periwinkle priced at £2,950, the same piece the brand selected to front its Paris billboard campaign. Tailoring elsewhere in the capsule turns tuxedo suiting into eveningwear, trimmed in Japanese lace and worn over corsetry, with bras styled as an outer layer that eventually builds into full dress form. The collection also includes a Valiant Velvet Cape in black and cream at £1,750 and a Valiant Lace Wrap Pant at £1,175.

Ascent takes a more sculptural approach, with embellished and batwing silhouettes in chartreuse and teal that lean closer to eveningwear than daywear. The Ascent Batwing Lace Gown in chartreuse runs to £2,625. Momentum pieces are built around burnout fabrication that gives dresses and slips a worn, almost archival texture, including a Momentum Burnout Bubble Gown in a tan Art Nouveau print at £3,100.

Drill fabric jumpsuits and wool suiting reference sport uniforms and workwear, paired against lace-trimmed tailoring and corsetry detail elsewhere in the range. Crisp cricket whites appear elevated into cream wool suiting, and a sculptural aviator-style denim jacket pulls the same uniform references into outerwear. Men’s silk scarves illustrated with aviation and sporting scenes are refashioned into fluid skirts and dresses, and one draped micro-dress is built entirely from illustrated scarves celebrating women who rewrote the rules in sport, motoring, and aviation.

Shearling, velvet, silk and mahogany leather carry the texture, and a chalk-blue leather bomber worn over a ruffled silk skirt is among the collection’s most repeated looks across the campaign. Flared jeans cinched with scarf-tied waists, described by Zimmermann as neckties and cascading panels, appear across several looks and give the tailoring pieces a sense of movement.

Where the campaign imagery leaned into tobacco, caramel, cream, and midnight blue, the retail pieces run to olive, mustard, teal, navy toile, and a fringed colourway called Spliced Prism. A Valiant Fringed Gown in that shade costs £2,950, in line with the rest of the eveningwear, while a Valiant Fringed Flare in the same print sits at £1,550 and a matching mini dress at £2,350.

The Cloud 91 bag returns as the accessories anchor, restyled as a small clutch in mustard, mahogany, and peacock black; the prices range between £450 and £700. Shoes follow a similar range: a Marvi sandal and an Atelier mule both stay under £600, while a Corsage sandal reaches £750.

Leather gloves in olive, a faux fur stole in khaki and a matching bolero round out the accessories, priced from £325 to £1,200. The Valiant Straight Pant, at £695, and the Fine Knit High Neck Top, £350, sit at the lower end of the ready-to-wear range. A Valiant Panelled Maxi Skirt in sand, at £1,550, and an Ascent Layered Blouse in black and cream, at £1,475, fill out the middle of the price range.

Anthony Seklaoui shot the campaign styled by Romy Frydman, with creative direction from Emil Vrisakis at Smile Agency. Model Apolline Rocco Fohrer appears throughout a modernist interior in Turin, with all-wood panelling and a geometric ceiling, in a gold lace gown and later in the Valiant Lingerie Gown in dark periwinkle. Zimmermann took the campaign onto a Parisian billboard in June, then brought it back for a second placement running throughout September at 10 rue Royale, timed to the pieces actually arriving in stores. Zimmermann has described the placement, its second in Paris, as a step toward establishing the city as a base for the brand alongside Sydney, where sisters Nicky and Simone Zimmermann founded the label in 1991.