In 1982, Agnes Denes made headlines by planting a wheat field in downtown Manhattan. The image of her standing among the wheat, with skyscrapers towering behind her, still carries a powerful message. “Her work speaks to the industrialization and obsession with wealth, Wall Street’s dominance, and how everything seemed to be moving in one direction,” Ilincic said before her show. Denes titled her project *Wheatfield—A Confrontation*. “That was over 40 years ago, and now we’ve only grown more disconnected from our humanity, from nature, from the planet. It resonated deeply with me. The clash between corporate giants and humanity feels all too real today,” the designer noted.

Ilincic’s show, held on the seventh floor of a Brutalist office building with sweeping views over London, evoked that sense of old corporate grandeur. The sharp, vertical lines of her tailored pieces fit perfectly with the venue’s architecture. But Ilincic was tapping into something more personal—a reflection on her shared Eastern European heritage with Denes, recalling the wheat fields of her childhood in Belgrade.

Though not confrontational, the connection came through as Ilincic presented her dresses, the heart of her collection. The prints, blurred and abstract, were inspired by aerial views of her hometown’s landscape, while raffia and viscose fringes mimicked the texture of wheat. The deeper melancholy of Ilincic’s vision surfaced in a recording of Sian Phillips reading *Dover Beach* by Matthew Arnold—a poem that laments the state of the world but clings to a fragile hope in love.