For Jil Sander Spring 2027, Simone Bellotti Walks the Line Between Severity and Softness

It’s been one year since Simone Bellotti made his debut at the helm of Jil Sander. His show in Milan this morning reaffirmed what fashion obsessives already know: This is a designer with a sharp point of view, rooted in expressions of minimalism and keen tailoring. The collection opened with a slick, supple, collarless leather jacket, buttoned from the neck to the navel. This silhouette became a theme, alongside sleek suit jackets with buttons starting near the collarbone, deep-V blazers, and long jackets cut to scrunch at the waist, along with beautifully slim-cut trousers and shirting to match.

Many of the garments had a monastic quality to them. Bellotti’s Jil Sander rests between the altar of minimalism and a sort of tailoring laboratory, blending the clinical with an exploration of the lyrical ’90s cuts that made the line so moving to begin with. He played at symmetry with a sculptural folded white miniskirt and sweeping capelike dresses that swayed to one side. Deep V-cut shirts nodded to fall ’95. The palette was muted, save a bold Yves Klein blue, a bright red, and a deep, autumnal orange. Faded pastels dominated alongside office gray, navy, and black shades—a striking display of color at the hands of stylist and frequent W contributor Charlotte Collet.

Some highlights: a pair of perfectly retrained straight-leg trousers worn with a pale mint shirt whose top button was a steel ball; Saskia de Brauw in a black office skirt with a jagged sheer chiffon layer blocked at its end, and a streamlined trench; and those scrunched jackets and blazers, each adding just the right level of disheveled to otherwise impeccably put-together looks. Similarly, crinkles on lush silk dresses and skirts signaled a designer leaving space for a bit of intentional imperfection.

The show ended with a poem referencing flowers growing through concrete and the seeds of revolution. At Jil Sander, harsh reality is just outside the studio, yet Bellotti’s vision is clearly one of hope.