POET-LAB Fall/Winter 2026 - Inside the Lab

High-end drag, drama and Princess Diana. Oh, and the reclaiming of identity, of course. For FW26, Poet-Lab invites us Inside the Lab, not as spectators, but as witnesses to a subtle, seismic shift. Founded in 2023 by Creative Director Giuseppe Iaciofano, the London-based label has quickly carved a space for itself within the evolving language of genderless luxury streetwear. Its signature codes poetic minimalism, oversized geometry, and an almost architectural restraint, which are underpinned by something far more intimate: resilience.

Crafted from repurposed deadstock fabrics, each piece carries the quiet integrity of reinvention, speaking to a brand that treats sustainability not as a trend, but as testimony.

Iaciofano’s own narrative is woven through the seams. From Milan’s polish to New York’s pragmatism, from surviving cancer to transmuting discrimination into strength, his journey informs Poet-Lab’s ethos: clothing as liberation, not limitation. “Inclusivity-ethical, for me, is one word,” he has said. “Everyone can wear a Poet-Lab with no judgment of who can wear what.” It is a philosophy that rejects imposed binaries and prescribed identities, insisting instead on freedom of self-definition.

Inside the Lab, staged at Spitalfields E1, reflects on the systems that shape women, socially, culturally, visually and gently questions the idea of refinement as something externally imposed. Rather than staging a rebellion, Iaciofano proposes something more enduring: clarity. Control. Conscious authorship. The moment a woman ceases to adapt to expectation and instead claims her own narrative.

The silhouettes are precise, elongated, and assured. Columns and slips fall with intention; tailoring is spare and architectural. Bare shoulders, asymmetrical cuts, open backs and restrained draping reveal skin with deliberation rather than decoration. Sensuality is present, but never performative. There are echoes of 1990s minimalism and the disciplined ease of the 1970s, yet the effect is neither nostalgic nor referential.

A quiet invocation of Diana, Princess of Wales, lingers in the collection’s emotional register: the idea of leading from the heart, of stepping beyond approval toward inner alignment. Not louder, but clearer. Not dramatic, but decisive. These are garments for women who no longer seek permission to exist.

The casting underscored the message with eloquence. Elton Ilirjani, Elliott with 2 T’s, and Tayce, who closed the show in a reimagining of Princess Diana’s wedding dress, expanded the parameters of femininity beyond tradition or biology. It was not femininity bestowed, but femininity claimed: crafted, resilient, self-authored.

Bridgerton actress and former elite athlete Genevieve Chenneour brought another dimension to the runway, embodying a modern womanhood shaped equally by discipline and grace. Soft power, fully owned.

In Inside the Lab, Poet-Lab refines its proposition. Genderless luxury becomes a vehicle for intellectual femininity; streetwear geometry softens into elongated elegance.

The mood throughout: quiet confidence. Sensual control. Intellectual femininity. If previous seasons explored reinvention, FW26 feels like an arrival.

Not a rebellion, but a reclamation.

Words by Lewis Robert Cameron