“A new collection finds beauty in the space between artifice and truth”

Photo courtesy of ERDEM

There is a particular kind of magic in not being able to look away — the held breath of an audience watching a performer defy gravity, unsure of what, or who, they are truly seeing. It is this exact tension that ERDEM channels for its Pre-Spring 2027 collection, a meditation on duality drawn from the extraordinary life of Barbette, the Texan-born trapeze artist whose androgynous performances captivated 1920s and ’30s Paris.

A Muse Out of Time

Barbette was no ordinary entertainer. Suspended high above his audiences in elaborate costume, he performed as a woman for the better part of his act, only revealing his male identity in its final moments. The reveal was the point — a deliberate collapse of the line between artifice and truth. It was precisely this beguiling ambiguity that drew the fascination of Jean Cocteau and Man Ray, who found in Barbette a living embodiment of the era’s appetite for shape-shifting identity. For Pre-Spring 2027, ERDEM returns to that world — one where glamour and disguise were never far apart, and where transformation was its own form of poetry.

Tailoring Meets Trapeze

The collection plays out as a series of contrasts, each piece negotiating between opposing forces. Soft, feminine shapes drawn from 1920s showgirl and acrobatic costuming sit alongside sharper, more masculine tailoring. Structured grey suiting and workwear-inspired textiles are set against the fragility of translucent organza and the languid drape of crumpled satin — a wardrobe caught, quite literally, between two identities.

A standout silhouette reimagines the archival shapes of the era through exaggerated, pannier-inspired cage constructions. Bodices, fitted close to the body, erupt into suspended volumes that feel as architectural as they do theatrical — a nod to the spectacle of circus costuming, reinterpreted for the present. Elsewhere, dresses seem to hold motion within their seams, their forms shaped as if mid-flight. Blurred prints heighten the sense of disorientation, echoing the frenetic energy of an acrobat caught mid-performance, somewhere between control and chaos.

Glamour, Fractured

Embellishment throughout the collection nods to the opulence of Parisian stage costume, but never without complication. Crystals appear broken rather than pristine; feathers trail rather than sit; textures are intentionally distressed. The effect is a kind of imperfect glamour — beauty that admits its own seams. Evening pieces carry a jewelled delicacy, but are deliberately grounded: paired back with masculine tailoring, or roughened by utilitarian denim, lending the collection a thoroughly modern edge.

Artifice as Truth

Underpinning the entire collection is a distinctly Cocteau-esque idea: that artifice, far from being the opposite of authenticity, can be one of its purest expressions. Barbette’s performances destabilized fixed notions of gender and appearance, offering instead something elusive — never quite landing on one truth, and more powerful for it. ERDEM’s Pre-Spring 2027 collection carries that same spirit forward, proposing that the most honest clothing might be the kind that refuses to be easily defined.

In an industry often preoccupied with certainty — of fit, of trend, of identity — ERDEM’s latest offering is a welcome act of suspension. Like Barbette himself, it asks to be watched closely, and rewards those willing to look twice.

ERDEM is featured in LUSH Magazine’s Haute Currency issue. Pre-Spring 2027 pieces will be available via select retailers.