Paris couture week opens amid scorching heat and high-profile debuts

Schiaparelli opened Paris haute couture week on Monday at 10 a.m., starting a four-day calendar of about 30 maisons and collections as the French capital baked under punishing temperatures. The Fédération de la Haute Couture et de la Mode set the Fall/Winter 2026-2027 season from July 6 to July 9, with couture houses from Chanel and Balenciaga to Dior, Jean Paul Gaultier, Elie Saab, Viktor&Rolf, Iris van Herpen, Yuima Nakazato, Robert Wun, Zuhair Murad and Manish Malhotra filling the official schedule.

Balenciaga was slated for Wednesday at 11:30 a.m., one of the week’s most watched slots because it marked Pierpaolo Piccioli’s debut at the house. Chanel was listed twice on Tuesday, at 10 a.m. and again at noon, a reminder of how tightly packed the invitation-only couture circuit was across Paris. The week’s draw came not only from the clothes on the runway but from the turnover in creative direction at some of the industry’s most closely watched labels.

The weather was impossible to ignore. Western Europe had just endured its hottest June on record, and the late-June heatwave was among the most brutal the region had seen in 50 years. Preliminary counts pointed to about 3,700 excess deaths across France, Belgium and the Netherlands, with France alone recording around 1,000. That backdrop gave the couture calendar a sharper edge, especially as guests and photographers moved between air-conditioned salons and sunlit sidewalks.

The contrast between climate reality and luxury spectacle defined the week’s visual language. In Piccioli’s Balenciaga debut, models moved in voluminous shapes, including ballooning gowns, capes and pants embroidered with ostrich feathers, under the baking midday sun. The staging reinforced what couture has always sold, precision, fantasy and control, while the heat outside underlined how difficult that promise can be to sustain in a warming Europe.