To know the work of designer Iris van Herpen is to know the beauty of a mushroom gill (her Spring 2021 collection drew patterns from the mycelium network), the glow of bioluminescent algae (Fall 2025 included a “living dress” made with 125 million Pyrocystis lunula organisms) and the movement of a bird mid-flight (as seen in the glass wing pleats of her Fall 2018 collection). Since founding her namesake brand in 2007, the forward-thinking Dutch couturier has looked to fields spanning mathematics, neuroscience, marine biology, paleontology, mycology, mineralogy, astronomy, architecture and dance to inspire her fantastical haute couture garments.Those wide-ranging sources of inspiration are at the center of Brooklyn Museum’s newest fashion exhibit, “Iris van Herpen: Sculpting the Senses.”
“Iris van Herpen: Sculpting the Senses”Photo: Courtesy of Brooklyn Museum
“What I found amazing about Iris was that she had a very different source of inspiration than most designers,” Matthew Yokobosky, senior curator of fashion and material culture at the Brooklyn Museum (who has staged exhibitions on Dior, Virgil Abloh and Thierry Mugler), tells Fashionista. “Of course, we have designers who are influenced by orchids or flowers… but Iris is looking at it beyond just a flower, just a leaf. She’s looking at structures. She’s looking at growth systems. She’s looking at how the world’s weather is changing, the ocean, the sky. It’s a much more complex box of inspiration.”Having originated at the Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris in 2023, the “mid-career retrospective” brings together more than 140 haute couture creations alongside contemporary art pieces, design objects, scientific artifacts and natural history specimens. The show is not chronological. Instead, it offers an immersive look into van Herpen’s mind over the last 19 years. “The exhibition feels like a diary,” van Herpen tells Fashionista. “Shows that have been done, and processes, and collaborations.”
“Iris van Herpen: Sculpting the Senses”Photo: Courtesy of Brooklyn Museum
The exhibit is organized into 11 thematic sections that mirror the breadth of van Herpen’s inspirations and commitment to environmental preservation. “Sensory Sea Life” dives beneath the ocean’s surface with otherworldly looks inspired by marine organisms, while “Cosmic Bloom” (above) looks outward to space and the multiverse beyond with dresses that are displayed sideways and upside down. A 2016 glass-sphere dress, set in the “Water and Dreams” space (below), opens the show and brings to mind the sculptural mini Eileen Gu wore to the 2026 Met Gala, alongside liquid-like sculptural gowns and air-like fabrics that evoke waves, waterfalls and drops. On the other end, “New Nature” concludes the exhibit by imagining a post-human world with the possibility of rebirth and transformation, with garments including a look that Beyoncé wore on the Amsterdam stop of her 2023 “Renaissance” tour.
“Iris van Herpen: Sculpting the Senses”Photo: Courtesy of Brooklyn Museum
Van Herpen is a master sculptor of silhouettes that appear to defy the laws of physics. That sense of impossibility is inseparable from her passion for experimentation. In 2010, she pioneered the use of 3D printing in haute couture with the “Crystallization” collection, setting the stage for the fusion of technology and craftsmanship that has come to define the brand. In the years since, she’s worked with innovative processes including laser cutting, magnetic sculpting and silicone molding and made progress in sustainable material development (her most recent collection featured a fiber made from sugarcane) — all while preserving couture practices. “There have always been those experimenters in the history of art and the history of fashion, and I loved that Iris has taken it to another level. She’s incorporating new technologies that haven’t been addressed before,” Yokobosky says. “[But] Iris is not just technology. She’s also those traditional handicrafts, and she’s finding the place where they come together. Iris is an artist who’s looking at the past and the future and finding a way to bring them together.”That marriage of technology and technique comes into focus in the “Atelier,” which captures the essence of the brand’s Amsterdam studio, where each collection begins with “hands-on material experimentation.” The room highlights the work of van Herpen’s many collaborators (who are credited throughout the exhibition), like biodesigner Chris Bellamy and architect Philip Beesley, while offering a look at the making of the garments through embroidery samples, laser-cut drawings, 3D-printing materials, and a sketchbook visitors can touch. “You’re really going inside my process and my mind here,” says van Herpen. “The spirit of my atelier is embodied in this space.”
“Iris van Herpen: Sculpting the Senses”Photo: Courtesy of Brooklyn Museum
For a designer known for creating universes around runway shows, the exhibition similarly builds a distinct atmosphere for every vignette. Videos, lighting, movement and a soundscape — the latter by composer, music producer and van Herpen’s partner, Salvador Breed — help activate the galleries. The sound is especially potent in “Skeletal Embodiment” (above), where a visceral rattling sends a chill through the space as visitors pass garments that mimic human remains and fossils. The eeriness bleeds into “The Mythology of Fear,” which includes the snake-covered dress (below) worn by Björk on tour in 2011.
“Iris van Herpen: Sculpting the Senses”Photo: Courtesy of Brooklyn Museum
Van Herpen sees a connection between putting on fashion shows (which get a dedicated video space in the exhibit) and an art retrospective. “I love doing the shows because it carries a certain energy. But what is somewhat frustrating about the show is that we work for months and months on these pieces — sometimes a year! — and then they are gone in like 10 minutes,” she says. “[At an exhibition,] people can come so much closer to the work. You can have your own personal time with a piece. You can be there for an hour if you want, and you can understand the work so much better, and you appreciate the craftsmanship that goes in there, and that is just not possible to embody in a fashion show.” Plenty of fashion exhibitions have succeeded at showcasing beautiful garments. What makes “Sculpting the Senses” compelling is the way it places van Herpen’s avant-garde designs in cerebral conversation, not only with contemporary art, but also with artifacts and natural history specimens. Van Herpen’s color-forward gowns (including a red dress seen on Anne Hathaway in “Mother Mary”) naturally come alive alongside the pigmented works of collaborator Kim Keever, as well as pieces from artists like Nick Knight and James Turrell; but it is often the less expected pairings that invite the deepest dialogue.
“Iris van Herpen: Sculpting the Senses”Photo: Courtesy of Brooklyn Museum
An ornate 19th century maple-and-beech chair sharpens the eye to the details of a wood-like dress from the 2012 collection, inspired by Europe’s Gothic cathedrals (above). Early 20th-century renderings of marine life and brain function from scientists Ernst Haeckel and Santiago Ramón y Cajal, respectively, reveal visual precedents for the patterns and structures echoed in the garments nearby. An 80-million-year-old dinosaur skull brings out the edges and coiled lines of the mollusc-inspired dress from van Herpen’s 2016 collection.Van Herpen sees these pairings as entirely natural. “Artifacts in the exhibition speak to our origins, who we are, and I think fashion ultimately asks that question: Who are we, and where are we going?” Beyond offering fans a deeper understanding of her artistic process, she hopes the exhibition becomes “a point of interest for people that normally are not into fashion.”
“Iris van Herpen: Sculpting the Senses”Photo: Courtesy of Brooklyn Museum
“Everything that I do is very intuitive. My mind combining all of the disciplines into one, that’s just natural to me… but not everyone sees the connection,” she continues. “It made me realize how important it is to have these conversations to broaden the perspective on fashion. People tend to narrow it down to a very small isolated bubble, but it is connected to all of these worlds.”“Sculpting the Senses” refuses to treat couture as an echo chamber. Van Herpen’s work may begin with the spectacle and beauty, but it rarely stops there. It opens the door to exploration — to the ocean floor, to bone structures, to Greek myths, to microscopic organisms, to distant galaxies — and argues that couture can be more than a display of aesthetics or technique. It can be a way of asking how humans fit into the larger world around us.“Iris van Herpen: Sculpting the Senses” is on view at the Brooklyn Museum from May 16 through Dec. 6, 2026.
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