La Collectionneuse: Burk Akyol FW26
Samuel Kaur
La Collectionneuse by Burk Akyol is like a story about Marilyn Monroe walking in Manhattan with Arthur Miller. No one notices her. He teases her about it. She asks: “You want me to be Marilyn?” and then she shifts her body, through the streets with her iconic walk. And the crowd forms, leaving Miller speechless. The show does not stage this story. It does not need to. In a similar way, La Collectionneuse captures a transformation that doesn’t demand to be performed overtly.
Year eight
This is the eighth year of the label, La collectionneuse. For seven years, the designer worked in near isolation, crafting a unique language in a small, home-based atelier. This show reflects that process, working at the craft until it becomes instinct. This season is the result: clearer, leaner, yet still restless.
First, the black-and-white tiled runway sharpens everything when a long black coat that erases the body appears on the runway.
A camel coat with strong shoulders and a clean waistline. Additionally, a deep green knit is paired with a voluminous plum skirt. A cream blouse, almost bourgeois, tucked into narrow black trousers. The codes begin to soften. It should be noted that there is movement now, a sense of air between fabric and skin.
The collection plays with tension. A glossy black dress catches the light like wet pavement. A heavy sweater over loose trousers suggests a boyish nonchalance.
La Collectionneuse
Even when it’s not literal, Paris is present in the ideas behind the looks. Inspired by filmmakers like Éric Rohmer and Agnès Varda, you can sense the ghosts of their women, the quiet strength of Varda’s heroines, the delicate presence of Rohmer’s. The designer calls this Parisienne La Collectionneuse. She collects clothes, codes, lovers, and fragments of herself.
She is monomaniac. Clearly, Color remains controlled: black, navy, camel, punctuated by plum and a flash of gold wrapped at the hip. The restraint makes the moments of softness hit harder. A skirt swirls just enough to reveal the leg mid-step. A hand stays in the pocket. It feels like walking home at dawn after dancing all night.
What makes the show compelling is its refusal to shed skin dramatically. Above all, the show speaks of longing for the city again, of dinners, drinks, and dancing until morning. You sense that freshness that is brought back into life. The muscles are back under the clothes. There is confidence now. A designer who built walls around his work is opening a window.
It’s a sharpening. As well as that, the codes are intact, but they breathe. And somewhere between discipline and desire, between solitude and Paris at dawn, the collection finds its wave.
Visit the BURK AKYOL online shop.
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Samuel is a Paris-based creative marketing student and writer. When he got bad grades in school or behaved badly, his parents punished him by making him read - maybe that's where it began. What felt like torture at the time has now turned out to be a great gift.
Two years ago, he moved to Paris for his fashion studies. Since then the urge to write has only grown stronger. When he's not working on articles, he writes mostly film scripts or poetry. Beyond writing, he has a deep-rooted passion for cinema and enjoys engaging in all forms of filmmaking.
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