Fall Winter 2023, Gabriela Hearst
New York

A house is not a machine to live in. It is the shell of a man – his extension, his release, his spiritual emanation.

Eileen Gray was a multifaceted artist, architect, and furniture designer, widely recognised as a pioneering force in modernism across all her disciplines. While she collaborated closely with Le Corbusier and shared many of his design principles, she notably distanced herself from his view of houses as "machines for living”. Gray's approach was more human-centric, prioritising the emotional and experiential dimensions of space.

This philosophy influenced both the Taller in 1968, with their conceptualisation of La Ciudad en el Espacio – large geometric matrices that could expand both upwards and outwards, forming units, communities, and entire cities to promote new social ways of urban living – and, much later, Gabriela Hearst's Autumn Winter 2023 collection. Titled “Now as Future”, the collection drew from Gray’s iconic colour palette and her balanced geometries, where functionality and beauty exist in harmony.

The runway set brought together all three creators: an oil-spill black podium, above which hovered a large-scale model of La Ciudad en el Espacio. The original model, created in the 1960s from wooden blocks, was reimagined with a smooth white finish, its reflection visible on the dark floor below.