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While many designers choose scaled and smaller runway shows this season, Emily Bode Aulla took this path in a completely different direction and avoided a traditional parade of models as a whole.
Instead, she created an intimate, mise en scène in miniature, where her collection was presented as a tiny knitting sweater, tailor -made lorts, shorts, shoes, suits and cafts on handmade dolls in the vestibul of a Parisian theater.
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In the neo-baroque rooms, complicated and delicate dioramas showed scenes from the life of Morris “Moose” Charlap, the American composer, whose music inspired Bode’s recent work. They showed key moments in mosses, including his summer camp in childhood, in which he got his nickname and favorite place in New York Central Park, where he would relax before the shows.
Dolls in these scenes were dressed from Bode’s collection.
It was a wonderful and delightful touch of fresh air in the middle of a hot fashion week.
The collection entitled “The Expressionist” is a continuation of Bode’s homage to Charlap, which is primarily known to compose the score to Broadway’s “Peter Pan” in the golden age of the music theater. He died of diabetes with 45 complications.
To honor the work of the moss, Bode Aujla Charlaps son Bill Charlap invited to play a few songs from his father to the audience. While Bill reminded the audience that he was “not a singer”, he sang the melodies and tickled the elves between the stories behind Mooses song and stories from his childhood.
A particularly moving memory remembered a trip to Paris a year before Moose’s death. “Every turn in Paris brings a memory,” said Bill, illustrating the deep personal response of the place and the tribute.
“Moose had a really wonderful ability to grasp the essence of what it meant to be a child and what childhood and this turning point before they grow up meant,” said Bode. She tried to grasp this miracle in the puppet collection.
Bode Aujla said that her cousin and the current intern reminded her of the clothes when setting up the scene that she sewed as children for her dolls.
“It was somehow closed,” she said. “It has always been a passion of mine, and I also think that it is a really wonderful way to put this collection in a new light.”
The collection was exhibited in its Paris showroom. “The buyers have already seen the clothes and they can see them online,” she told WWD. “This is only one way to become a child again.”
Bode organized a runway show in Paris two and a half years ago and opened its first boutique with an intimate cocktail party here during the Fashion Week in March. The designer based in New York continues to feel the city, but is approaching in a completely unconventional way.
Bode’s Spring ’26 presentation was completely adorable and expanded the emotional potential of a fashion show.
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