Fashion’s fascination with tarot, psychics and astrology …
Fashion folk have long embraced the mystic. Gabrielle Chanel’s apartment in rue Cambon in Paris was adorned with crystal balls and lion heads (the latter a nod to her Leo zodiac symbol), such was her predilection for future-gazing.
Gemini silk scarf, €220; www.aspinaloflondon.com.
As fashion lore goes, Christian Dior established his couture house amid the devastation of World War II on the advice of a French clairvoyant named Madame Delahaye. Fast-forward to 2025 and Jonathan Anderson, the Northern Irish designer now leading the house of Dior, was pictured having a tarot reading with Trevor Ballin (owner of Studio Tricot), whose glittering client roster includes Emma Corrin, Dan Levy and Celine’s creative director Michael Ryder.
Gabriela Hearst.
It’s unsurprising, really: a designer’s remit is to be a purveyor of what’s next. In the case of SS26, references to the occult manifested across Fashion Month, referenced as casually as talk of cabbage (the new ‘It’ vegetable) or reformer pilates. Fortune-telling was on the mind of Gabriela Hearst; each look in the designer’s show was inspired by a card in the Major Arcana. “My mother gave me my first tarot at 18,” Hearst explained. “I have been going to the same tarot reader for over a decade, every June.” The collection paid homage to Salvador Dalí as well as the British-Mexican surrealist artist Leonora Carrington – both esoteric types who made their own tarot decks.
Model Jerry Hall at Completedworks SS26 presentation.
At its London Fashion Week presentation, jewellery brand Completedworks engaged supermodel Jerry Hall to give a compelling performance as “the belle of the crystal ball” Miss Edie Grey. Part medium, part QVC host, Hall communed with the spirits haunting the season’s coveted jewellery collectibles and interior objets. “Sylvia was born in 1965 … loved pearls, hated oysters …”
Conscious Clarity cards, €45.
In pop culture, think pieces offhandedly discuss ditching therapy for old school or magical methods of healing: mediums, astrology, crystals charged by the light of a heaving moon. Pepper this with new cynicism for the business of wellness – perhaps Goop’s vaginal jade and rose-quartz eggs, later disproved, quelle surprise, to balance hormones and quell uterine prolapse, signalled the beginning – and it seems mystic is going mainstream(ish).
Designer Elsa Schiaparelli, who had a lifelong interest in astrology.
Fashion brands see the appeal of the preternatural, says Tara Marzuki (@modernmystic___), who runs energetic workshops for labels such as eyewear brand Ace & Tate. Marzuki likens these to traditional Celtic wisdom circles which, while sounding woo-woo on paper, simply “help women tap into their intuition”. Leaning into things mystic could range from something as simple as wearing natural fibres – they help energetic flow, Marzuki finds – or embracing a lucky charm.
Brass zodiac brooches, €1,300 each; www.schiaparelli.com.
Gold-plated Pisces necklace, €195; www.monicavinader.com.
Evil eye bracelet, €307.50; www.timelesspearly.com.
Christian Dior carried a four-leaf clover in his pocket, a talisman of sorts. The symbol of luck was used to reimagine the house’s Lady Dior bag this season in a vivacious green. In this writer’s case, a bespoke engagement ring bearing the motif of the Greek evil eye, or mati, by jewellery designer Natasha Sherling, wards off bad juju.
Evil eye bag charm, €387; www.sageandsalt.com.
As for designers, it’s not as simple as being told red is no, green is go; predicting the future reflects a need for control in an increasingly uncertain world. The New York designer Isaac Mizrahi also visits Ballin for annual tarot readings. “Sometimes, I take more from a psychic than from therapy,” he said recently. “A therapist listens; a psychic tells you what’s going to happen.” Intuition? For spring? With its appeal to the creative spirit, fortune-telling takes a welcome swipe at the mundane. If not groundbreaking then, at the very least, it will make for interesting fashion.
John Derian Paper Goods puzzle, €24.14; www.amazon.ie.
Marfa eau de parfum, €225; www.memoparis.com.
Minus Cumulus hand cream, €13; www.maisonmatine.com.
