Schiaparelli is having a moment.
The brand has picked up steam in recent years, ever since the arrival of creative director Daniel Roseberry. Lady Gaga wore a Schiaparelli gown with bird broach to President Joe Biden’s inauguration in 2020; Bella Hadid wore a nearly breast-baring Schiaparelli wool dress with strategically placed lung-passageway necklace to the Cannes Film Festival in 2021, and Doja Cat donned red Schiaparelli, complete with 30,000 body crystals, to the brand’s most recent couture show.
Data from Launchmetrics shows that when it came to Paris Couture Week, Schiaparelli came out on top in terms of media impact value, generating $44.5 million. Schiaparelli’s success was attributed to their animal-head dresses and their roster of A-listers in attendance.
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The $44.5 million in MIV is a four-time increase from the last couture season. Kylie Jenner alone helped the brand earn $18 million in MIV. Doja Cat generated $16.7 million in MIV through online and social channels.
The brand may be garnering more interest now, but Schiaparelli has a near-century-old legacy.
The fashion house was founded in 1927 in Paris by Elsa Schiaparelli and became known for its Surrealism and eccentric fashions. In between the two World Wars, Schiaparelli established herself as a prominent figure in fashion, and some fashion historians described her as Coco Chanel’s biggest rival.
But in an era where couture was king, Schiaparelli’s house didn’t find huge commercial success. She ultimately shuttered the brand’s clothing collections in 1954. In 1957, she launched a company for her perfume licenses, and the business was acquired by Italian businessman Diego Della Valle in 2007.
Della Valle truly began reviving the fashion side in 2013, when Marco Zanini was appointed creative director. While Zanini’s collections were well received by critics and the press, he departed quickly and left the post in 2014.
Zanini was succeeded by Bertrand Guyon, who helped set the stage for the modern Schiaparelli era.
Guyon’s tenure at the house lasted from 2015 to 2019, and during that time, he oversaw the brand’s ready-to-wear and couture collections.
With a penchant for astrology-inspired designs and theatrical couture creations, he quickly won the favor of a handful of celebrities, including Celine Dion, Tilda Swinton and Lady Gaga. At the 2019 Oscars, Helen Mirren wore a Schiaparelli gown.
Following Guyon’s departure, Schiaparelli named Roseberry creative director — and the brand took off.
Before Schiaparelli’s spring 2023 couture show in Paris even started, Jenner and Doja Cat went viral for their arrival looks. Jenner wore a custom-made ruched black dress with a lion’s head shawl that sparked controversy on the internet. Then, there was Doja Cat, who donned a head-to-toe red Schiaparelli outfit complete with 30,000 Swarovski crystals on her body, by legendary makeup artist Pat McGrath.
Before the the animal-head dresses (not made from real animal heads) landed on fashion radars everywhere, Hadid helped turn heads in a formfitting black wool gown cut under her chest, paired with a gold-dipped necklace in the shape of the bronchi passageway of the lungs, adorned with rhinestones.
The brand has made its way into the political fashion set, too.
First Lady Jill Biden wore a custom Schiaparelli ensemble to meet with Queen Letizia of Spain in June, and in 2019 at the American Portrait Gala, former First Lady Michelle Obama wore a custom Schiaparelli couture gown dripping in crystals.
Then, there was Lady Gaga, in a custom Schiaparelli gown at Joe Biden’s inauguration, where she sang the national anthem and drew attention for the large bird brooch on the dress’ bodice.
On Thursday, the brand showed its first ready-to-wear collection in Paris, meant to show “who this Schiaparelli woman really is,” Roseberry told WWD.