“It’s almost 25 years now that I’ve been in business,” Ulla Johnson said, and you could hear the weight of that number land. Not triumphantly. More like… wow. With every new horrifying global crisis (and there have been many, thank you very much), she talked about having to recommit—again and again—to the things she actually believes in. Strength and softness. Beauty and power not canceling each other out. Colour. Craft. Fabric that makes you stop and feel something. The good stuff. The things worth defending when everything else feels a little on fire.

She’s heading into a big year, too—launching a beauty line, opening her first store outside the U.S., in London. No small moves. And the collection felt like it was trying to meet that moment head-on, almost over-eagerly so. It was a full-on potpourri. Dressed-up denim at one end, boudoir-adjacent slips and tap pants in absinthe and black at the other, with ’70s-leaning pantsuits and feather-trimmed party dresses popping up in between. Normally, Johnson’s shows are anchored by her artist collaborations—those lush, expressive prints—but this time that energy was pared back to a single written contribution: original program notes by Susan Orlean. A quieter kind of collaboration. More cerebral. Less visual glue.

And you could feel that absence. With so much going on, the collection didn’t quite cohere the way her recent outings have. Styling choices—opera gloves here, knee socks there—felt like they were having separate conversations, occasionally talking over each other. Not wrong exactly, just… not aligned.

Where everything clicked was where it usually does for her: the bohemian dresses. The clothes that feel like they’ve always lived in her world. A multicoloured knit with a fringed hem that moved just right. A black dress scattered with metallic fil coupé flowers, catching the light in that quietly magical way. When Johnson leans into that space—romantic but grounded, soft but assured—you’re reminded why she’s lasted nearly 25 years in the first place. And why, even now, she keeps choosing to recommit.