Y2K doesn’t end until Rebecca Hessel Cohen says it does. For her spring 2027 runway show at the new Dante on Elizabeth Street in Nolita, the designer, a lifelong New Yorker, paid homage to her noughties youth.
Hessel Cohen grew up idealizing magazine editors, publicists, and scenesters whose glamorous (if not slightly sleazy) lives remained gloriously untainted by social media. “We worked all day. We went out, we slept a few hours, and did it all over again, and that was it,” she said backstage at the show. The collection aimed less to capture the visual mood of the time and more the free-spiritedness.
The designer offered plenty of pieces that would appeal to past Delia*s catalog subscribers: sparkly scarf belts, floral slips, and low-waisted bottoms galore. “I always go back to that time because it feels so personal, and then we’ll try to give it the current edge,” Hessel Cohen said. The scene inside Dante was a manifestation of that goal. Despite the escapist powers of “Dreams” (both the Cranberries and Fleetwood Mac versions), the presence of Love Island and Real Housewives of Beverly Hills cast members—and their camera crews—snapped one back into the present.
Hessel Cohen stuck to her usual more is more brief this season, but she also made an effort to mix in a little toughness with raw-hemmed denim jackets and cargo pants embroidered with flowers. The designer hinted at LoveShack’s next big step at the end of her show when she sent an eyelet wedding dress dotted with sequins down the runway. The wedding bells are ringing for the LoveShackFancy girl!
