Standing Ground

Standing Ground presented twenty-eight looks at the Embassy of Ireland in Paris on 6 July 2026, entering the official Haute Couture Week calendar as an FHCM Guest House. The salon-scale show refined Stewart’s draped columns through moulded corsets, internal tubular structures, trapped mirrored beads and deadstock fabrics in mandarin, periwinkle, lemon-lime and metallic grey.

The collection’s specialist labour was deliberately separated by function. Mr Pearl developed moulded corsetry, Maison Vermont contributed embroidery, and Natalie B. Coleman coordinated a Monaghan network that executed fifteen metres of Carrickmacross lace from Stewart’s drawings for the finale gown. The invitation established a major institutional milestone but did not confer permanent Haute Couture Member status or create a separate Standing Ground couture division.