It has been over a year since John Galliano left Maison Margiela after a decade-long tenure – a time defined by voraciously creative collections and theatrical runway presentations. This was epitomised by his swansong Artisanal show, which saw models saunter along the moonlit Seine like a troupe of strange, broken dolls (all the more so thanks to Pat McGrath’s gleaming porcelain make-up), recalling at once Fragonard’s shepherdesses and the seedy nightime denizens of Brassaï’s Paris en Nuit.
Since leaving, rumours have swirled as to what Galliano would do next, with everything from Gucci to Balenciaga posited as his next move (neither came true – the former chose Demna, the latter, Pierpaolo Piccoli). Today, though, it has been revealed that the British designer – who rose to fame as creative director of Dior in the late 1990s – will sign a two-year deal to collaborate with high street behemoth Zara, it has been announced this afternoon.
It follows a slew of high-profile collaborative projects that the Spanish brand has undertaken in recent years, from former Yves Saint Laurent creative director Stefano Pilati to model Kate Moss, photographer Steven Meisel and designer Samuel Ross. With Galliano, Zara has called it a ‘creative collaboration’ which will see him rework the house’s archives – ‘deconstructing and reconfiguring them into new seasonal expressions and creations’, said a statement from the brand.
Debuting in September 2026, the collections are expected to have a ‘couture’ sensibility and involve instilling existing silhouettes with his typically dramatic flourishes (as such, it will build on his work at Maison Margiela, where garments were often de- and reconstructed in a nod to the namesake founder’s design codes). The project emerged through conversations between Galliano and Marta Ortega Perez, the chair of Inditex, Zara’s parent company. She also runs her namesake MOP Foundation, which centres around a gallery in A Coruña, Spain, which has hosted exhibitions by a slew of photographic luminaries, from Annie Liebowitz to Helmut Newton.
Dior’s S/S 2026 show, which saw Jonathan Anderson inspired by a posy of cyclamen gifted to him by John Galliano
He confirmed to Vogue that he has already begun work on the collection in a Paris atelier. ‘To deliver fashion through that enormous platform – that, of course, that’s thrilling. And to be able to work with the kind of resources they have as well, that’s equally thrilling,’ he said. How the collection will be presented is yet to be seen, though Zara will likely wish to harness Galliano’s creative flair with a presentation during fashion week.
There has been a growing interest in Galliano’s work in recent months: earlier this year, Jonathan Anderson cited a posy of cyclamen gifted to him by the designer as the starting point of his first couture show for Dior (each guest received the same posy as the show’s invitation). ‘When I was at university, he was like a hero,’ Anderson told Business of Fashion at the time. ‘He is Dior in the public imagination, still to this day, because what he built was so big in terms of the rebirth of fashion. I loved the idea of him being back at Dior. I felt like it was a full-circle moment.’