The F/W 25-26 Runway: A Parade of Elegant Corpses
Maison Margiela’s Spring/Summer 2026 show looked like something between a funeral and a fever dream.
• Models walked with stiff, almost lifeless movements
• Many pieces were stained with raw flesh tones
• Face coverings made from crystals looked eerily like insect-infested skin
• Waist corsets mimicked mummified torsos
• The image of the shroud recurs
The visual recalls the masked nurses from Silent Hill – tightly wrapped bodies and faceless heads creates tension between desire and fear. Although Margiela’s models are wrapped with torn fabric and walk with mechanical movements, the dramatic curves of the tailoring accentuate the female form — as if paying tribute to this visual tradition.
Some looks also remind me of Ophelia, painted by British artist John Everett Millais. In the painting, Ophelia’s body floats in a flower-filled river. Her delicate embroidered gown closely resembles many of the sheer dresses in this show.
Necrophilic Obsession: When Love Refuses to Die
The image of dead beauty has long been a symbolic motif – it represents obsession. How a rotting wreck evokes love? Because it marks the end of desire, the leftover trace of intimacy, the haunting metaphor of “You were once so close, but now you’re gone.” At the heart of necrophilic obsession lies the inability to let go — a refusal to accept death, a resistance against the passage of time.
Real-life case: Carl Tanzler (United States, 1930s).
He fell in love with his patient, a 22-year-old woman. After she died of tuberculosis, he stole her corpse and lived with it for seven years. He used wire to hold her skeleton together, perfume to mask the smell, and replaced her eyes with glass beads. Even after the case was exposed, he insisted: “She wanted to stay.”
The key elements of this archetype
• A lover dies.
• The protagonist refuses to accept her death.
• The body is neither buried nor properly handled.
• The protagonist “lives with” the corpse, maintaining the illusion of normal life.
• As the body decays—reeking, collapsing, changing shape—the protagonist still refuses to let go.
• Eventually, either the corpse reaches its physical limit, society intervenes, or the protagonist suffers a psychological collapse.
Is this ‘love beyond death’, or is this merely a stubborn illusion — a phantom of affection that refuses to die?
The Western Take on Mono no Aware
Mono no aware is a Japanese aesthetic that refers to a gentle, melancholic awareness of life’s transience — the fleeting nature of things and emotions. It is not a sharp, overwhelming sorrow, but a quiet sensitivity to slow, subtle departures. It can be seen in falling blossoms, a broken fan, a faded garment, a dying flame, or a beauty die young. This aesthetic resonates across cultures with the earlier notion of necrophilic obsession — both embody a tension between love and fear, between desire and decay. Yet while mono no aware ultimately ends in mourning and release, what the runway presents is something far more intense: a state of heightened visual impact and emotional extremity. The models, moving mechanically, struggling yet gracefully holding themselves upright, seem to declare: “I can defy death to possess you, no matter how you stink, spilt or fall apart.”
But Maison Margiela neither condemns nor glorifies this obsession. Instead, it presents each “beautiful corpse” with clinical detachment, inviting the viewer to confront the decay of emotion and the lingering heat of intimacy — completing a distinctly Western interpretation of mono no aware.