E.T., Phone Chanel! How Fashion’s Labels Got Personal Again

For London-based demi-couture designer Ellie Misner, a clothing label can also serve as a little love letter commemorating a particularly special moment. Misner, who works on bespoke pieces, has taken to hand-embroidering her clients’s names above her own handwritten logo. For Raye, who fulfilled a long-held dream by headlining Reading and Leeds Festival, Misner stitched her name in burgundy thread into a crimson corseted gown. For Tems, whose Glastonbury main-stage performance marked another career milestone, it was a cobalt-blue signature sewn onto the inside of a midnight-blue ensemble. “My labels are my handwriting,” Misner tells Vogue, explaining that she handwrites the wearer’s name and then embroiders it, often choosing a thread that corresponds with the garment. For a performance that means so much to both artist and designer, it’s a way of marking the occasion, making the piece feel like more than just another custom commission. Misner likens the gesture to “a love note to their garment.” She adds: “I wish I could do it for everyone,” but the time-consuming process makes each one all the more special. These aren’t all bespoke gestures in the couture sense, but they share a certain spirit that insists on individuality, as well as the pleasure of details that one can keep entirely to oneself.

There’s something especially resonant about all this in an age of AI-generated images, algorithmically dictated taste, and increasingly impersonal consumption. Fashion, more and more, seems keen to remind us that there are actual people, with skills and emotions behind the clothes. At Chanel’s fall 2026 couture show, artist Joël Blanc painted the runway live in watercolors, capturing the spectacle in real time. And look at the new holiday campaigns from Prada, Dior, and Bottega Veneta, where all three have embraced the nostalgic charms of illustration and animation. Prada, in particular, has made a point of celebrating hand-drawn artistry, enlisting veteran animator John Pomeroy to conjure a whimsical winter wonderland populated by snow lynxes and mischievous mice.