Iris van Herpen is presented Sonic Starquakes during Paris Haute Couture Week on July 6, 2026, transforming the vibrations of stars, the turbulence of plasma and the geometry of galaxies into a collection about energy, sound and the body’s position in the universe. The collection begins with a scientific concept: the stars are not silent. Like earthquakes, stars send waves through the celestial bodies, creating subtle surface vibrations and rhythmic changes in brightness. Van Herpen translates this invisible movement into couture, using the body as a point where cosmic power and human presence meet.
The collection also addresses a Victorian artist and inventor Margaret Watts Hugheswho created the Eidophone to visualize the human voice. By singing on the instrument, Hughes caused the fine powders to move in intricate patterns formed by vibration. Van Herpen draws a line between these experiments and the study of stars, suggesting that sound, matter and energy share a language across the scale, from the human voice to the surface of a star.
The Helix Nebula dress becomes one of the defining works of the collection. Built around two sculptural floating lunar figures made of hand-blown plasma-infused glass, the piece responds to human touch. Around it, 10,000 hand-blown glass spheres are graded in size and adhered to UV illusion tulle. When worn, the body acts as a conductor, interacting with the electric field of the plasma. The dress brings tailoring into contact with the fourth state of matter, turning energy into a visible and reactive element within the garment.
The centerpiece of the collection, Fractal Universe, takes this idea further. Loaded into a particle accelerator and cryogenically preserved before the performance, the dress became a reservoir of trapped electrons. The original plan involved the model taking the piece down the runway, but the garment began to transform before the show. Fractal patterns spread across its surface as lightning channels are carved into its structure. What began as a loss of control became the most powerful expression of the collection’s theme: creation completed by an elemental force.
Throughout the runway, van Herpen resists fixed silhouettes. Laser-cut velvet runs across the body in wavy vertical patterns, continuing into the skin via hand embroidery. More than 30,000 iridescent glass spheres float above illusion tulle, dissolving the body into particles of light. Chiffons and organzas are hand-pleated on sweeping half-wheels and suspended within curved carbon fibres, giving the fabric the sensation of drifting through an invisible field.
The palette moves across the night sky, from midnight black and sapphire to cobalt, moonstone green, nebula red and stormlit silver. Light becomes an active material, shifting on transparent surfaces, glass, embroidery and plasma. The body appears less as a fixed form than as a temporary meeting point between cellular, planetary, and cosmic structures.
With Sonic Starquakes, Iris van Herpen continues to expand the definition of couture. The collection doesn’t just borrow from science as a visual reference. It brings scientific forces to the construction of the garments themselves, allowing vibration, electricity, plasma, glass and light to shape the clothing experience. Van Herpen proposes the body as a living field of energy, connected to the same patterns that form stars, storms, rivers and neural networks. In her hands, tailoring becomes less about the surface and more about the invisible forces that move everything.
