Late last month, Amy Smilovic joined the other 8.3 billion people on earth in mourning the death of Dolly Parton. “My icon,” she called Parton backstage at her spring 2027 show.
As it happened, Smilovic took an inspiration-gathering trip to Nashville earlier this year in preparation for her show. She kicked off her 30th-anniversary season with a Western-tinged offering. “You don’t go there and find people dressed like they’re going to the Grand Ole Opry,” she said. “But there’s that sense of real comfort in their own skin.”
That natural self-assuredness is what Smilovic was after this season, not a costumey Westernwear pastiche. Silver collar tips, snakeskin shoes, and classic Western shirting motifs dotted a collection otherwise filled with Smilovic’s signature funked up closet staples. Elsewhere, in place of the classic Western fringe jacket, Smilovic proposed skirts and tops with beaded tassels and a double leather belt that looked like a harness.
Styling and fabrication were also crucial to the brief. Audacious, shoulder-padded gingham shirting with a flamboyant kerchief found a mate in ultra-slim dark wash jeans and chunky-heeled square-toe shoes that would do well in Bushwick. Suiting (in the shrunken silhouette du jour) was fashioned in nylon for a dressed-down feel.
While it wasn’t an homage to Parton (no gravity-defying blonde hair or sequins in sight), Smilovic thought the goal—feeling comfortable in one’s own skin, even as an outsider—is one the country legend could get behind. As the models walked down the runway to “I Will Always Love You,” one couldn’t help but agree.