First came Proenza Schouler Fall/Winter 2026…

To officially kick off the Fall/Winter 2026 edition of New York Fashion Week, Jamaican-born designer Rachel Scott, who also helms the cult label Diotima, showed her collection for Proenza Schouler on Wednesday, February 11, a follow-up to a presentation in September that included her creative input. It is Scott’s first collection at the helm, after taking over from founders Jack McCullough and Lazaro Hernandez, who departed for Loewe last year. And with the support of Grammy Award-winning artiste Lauryn Hill, some of NY’s coolest women — Indya Moore, Hari Nef, Jemima Kirke — and an impressive cohort of fellow designers including Calvin Klein creative director Veronica Leoni, Chilean-born, Zero + Maria Cornejo designer Maria Cornejo, and Luar founder and creative director Raul Lopez of Luar in the frow, Scott’s FW26 debut was a memorable one.

The show took place four days before her own label Diotima presented its Fall 2026 collection.

From the designer:

“Because it’s the debut, I spent a lot of time thinking about it not just as a collection, but as like charting the path forward for the brand. First, I did a lot of just absorbing and looking at what they did over the last almost 25 years, and just learning and really understanding the process, but also the language and what they did. And then once I got through that, I really wanted to understand who the woman was. And I think the woman has maybe changed, the brand has been around long enough that she’s changed a few times, but I needed it to make sense to me. This is also [you know they’re guys and their admiration of women], but I’m a woman and wanted to get closer to her. So I wanted to add more layers and complexity to her. So I started re-reading feminine literature and I watched this incredible film Teorema by Pasolini, because I kept thinking about this idea of perfection that’s imposed on women and kinda what happens when that falls apart. And, it doesn’t fall apart here but she kind of evades the constraints of perfection and allows for complexity.”

CREDITS | Proenza Schouler F/W 2026

Runway Photography: @monicafeudi

Styling: @marikaella.ames

Casting: @julialangecasting

Hair Lead: @hollismithhead

Make-up Lead: @thomasdekluyver

Production: @bureaubetak

Make-up: @officialbyredo

Then Diotima Fall/Winter 2026: ‘Femme Cheval’…

For her own brand, Scott presented Femme Cheval on Sunday, February 15, 2026, a collection shaped by her long-standing fascination with the work of Cuban artist Wifredo Lam. His part-modernist, part-spiritual, part-defiantly anti-colonial work became a conceptual blueprint for the 34-look collection.

In a post-show interview with Fashionista, Scott said:

“This collection was a collaboration with a very powerful artist, and when you work with art, it’s very, very emotional. And it’s also tied to a really terrifying political moment, and this is a statement on that, and I think all of those things combined, it’s been super emotional. First and foremost, it’s anti-imperialist, and I think Wifredo Lam’s work was also anti-imperialist; it’s anti-colonial. He was from Cuba, I’m from Jamaica, and a lot is happening in our region right now… Having the opportunity to work with his work and bringing beauty and resistance through his art and through the collection was really important. The opening look was really very special, and we were sewing it to the final second. It takes his piece, the Femme Cheval, that is this figure that is a woman, who is part animal, part horse, part human, part spiritual. The woman, you know, she’s erotic, but she’s autonomous… It’s not for the colonial gaze. The opening look we took that piece, and we made a totally handmade organza intarsia… where it’s fabric manipulation of organza stitched into the artwork, and that for me is more special.”

CREDITS | Diotima F/W 2026

Photography: @ikaldama

Styling and Creative Consulting: @marikaella.ames

Hair: @joeygeorge with @oribe

Make-up: @yumilee_mua with @anastasiabeverlyhills

Casting: @julialangecasting

Production: @bureaubetak

In-House Production: @shayjohnsonstudio

Celebrities front-row (from left) Hari Nef, Grace Gummer, Ella Hunt, Celine Song and Yerin Ha at the Proenza Schouler Fall 2026 Ready-to-Wear show WWD

Model Zaryah (forefront) opened the show in a look inspired by Wifredo Lam’s Femme Cheval. .

Saint International models Tami Williams….

…and Naki Depass.

…and Lulu Management model Romae Gordon also hit the Diotima F/W 26 runway on Sunday, February 15, 2026.

Proenza Schouler Creative Director Rachel Scott after the Proenza Schouler fall 2026 show.

Backstage pass with Olympian Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce (centre) and Saint International models Tami Williams (left) and Naki Depass. (Photo: IG/@Tamiwilliamsofficial)

The Diotima F/W 2026 presentation pulled a star-studded front row including (from left) Jamaican track superstar Shelly-Ann Fraser Pryce; American fashion editor and stylist Gabriella Karefa-Johnson; and first lady of New York City Rama Duwaji.

Diotima Creative Director Rachel Scott takes her final bow. 

Proenza Schouler Creative Director Rachel Scott (left) and Grammy Award-winning artiste Lauryn Hill IG/@proenzaschouler

(Photo: https://www.christies.com/)