LACQUER & Layers of Memory

Phan Dang Hoang returns to Milan Fashion Week SS26 with LACQUER, a collection that feels like both homage and reinvention. Drawing inspiration from the lacquer paintings of Vietnamese master Nguyễn Gia Trí, Hoang embraces depth, layering, and the shimmering tension between surface and substance. In this season, the young designer stakes a claim: that tradition does not keep you static-it gives you roots from which to leap.

Hoang speaks of LACQUER not just as material elegance but as a metaphor for patience, craft, and layering in time. Vietnamese lacquer art is famously laborious: multiple coats, drying, and polishing to build gleam and depth. Hoang translates that into fabric and form. He uses multilayered treatments, shimmering finishes, and surface effects to evoke that reflective, near-mirrored quality.

The mood of the show is built around contrast: stasis vs motion, gloss vs matte, visibility vs shadow. One imagines lighting that picks up sheen and gloss, fabrics that catch and return light. There is an elegiac quality: about preserving craft, about memory, about heightening what once might have been mundane into something luminous. Hoang's trajectory, as a Vietnamese designer studying and working in Italy, gives this collection not only aesthetic weight but emotional resonance.

Hoang uses Vietnamese traditional materials like Lãnh Mỹ A silk, natural silk, linen, and importantly, lacquer-like finishes or textures. These surfaces are treated— layered, polished, contrasted with matte materials-to evoke the tactile depth of lacquer painting. Much like lacquer art requires many layers, the garments in LACQUER are built up: linings, overlays, semi-transparent panels, sometimes just thin veils over richer, heavier bodies underneath. These layering effects do more than provide texture-they create dimension in silhouette and in movement.

The color story draws from lacquer paintings: deep reds, golds, reflective blacks, rich neutrals, contrasted with softer tones to highlight shine and shadow. The glints of gold or red are not overused but placed as punctuation.

There is a tension between structure and fluidity. Some pieces seem sculpted, with crisp lines and polished finish; others sag, drape, ripple-soft long dresses, overskirts, perhaps sleeves or layers that move freely. The result is a dynamic interplay: sometimes armor, sometimes

Hoang doesn't merely borrow lacquer as a motif; he tries to embody its process: layering, polishing, depth. That gives the collection a richness that feels earned. The collection reinforces Phan Dang Hoang's identity as someone who bridges Vietnamese heritage and contemporary international fashion. LACQUER feels like a further chapter in his story of bringing traditional craft to global runways. The contrast between shine and matte, transparency and opacity, structure and flow offers multiple anchor points. Pieces that reflect light will stand out; those that ripple will invite movement.

Some finishes (lacquer-like surfaces, heavily layered or polished fabrics) may be delicate, high-maintenance, or less practical in everyday wear. How these translate off the runway will matter. The shimmering, layering, and nuances of surface will likely be most effective in movement and in person. There is a risk that photographs flatten the depth, losing the core drama. In a collection built on subtlety and finish, strong signature pieces are essential - something that stamps itself onto memory (a standout dress, coat, or detail). Without these, the whole might feel more texture than tale.

Phan Dang Hoang's LACQUER SS26 is a luminous evolution: a collection that asks us to slow down, see surfaces, feel layers, remember hands. It feels like growth — not of scale necessarily, but of depth. In this season, Hoang doesn't just show clothes; he shows how time, craft, and cultural memory can be encoded into fabric.

For those paying attention, LACQUER will likely be one of the quietly powerful reads of Milan SS26: not the loudest, but among the most enduring.