It was the night before Valentine’s Day, and Christian Cowan had hearts in his eyes. Like, fully. “I just really, really, really love this collection,” he said, and you could tell he meant it in that slightly stunned way—like he surprised himself. He talked about approaching it differently than anything he’s done before, which, coming from him, feels both dramatic and… kind of brave.

The biggest shift? Time. Actual time. The luxury of not sprinting headfirst into the abyss. Standing in a stairwell in a West Chelsea studio before the show, Cowan admitted it’s never been harder to be a young, independent brand right now, with the cost of everything—production, rent, air, existence—going up, up, up. (When the music briefly cut out right before the finale walk, it was hard not to feel that reality flash through the room.)

But slowing down paid off. Letting the story breathe paid off. You could sense it in the clothes—maybe influenced by his recent foray into Broadway costuming, maybe by working on the wardrobe for a film dropping later this year. His runway characters felt like vintage glamourpusses reimagined through a very now lens. He went deep into the archives, sourcing lace, lingerie, and fabrics from the 1920s through the 1950s, then carefully undoing their original intentions. He talked openly about how constrictive and unpleasant those silhouettes were for women like Marlene Dietrich and Doris Day, and made a point of loosening everything up. Sexy tops were grounded by low-slung Bermuda shorts and straight-leg trousers. Disheveled nighties met pearls that felt anything but polite. Liquid silk gowns clung to the body like a second skin, taped on with intention.

And maybe—just maybe—Cowan’s muse is growing up alongside him. After eight years of showing collections, it’s easy to forget he’s only just entered his 30s. Sure, there were suspender tights and garter belts flashing underneath, but the top halves told a different story: fur-trimmed blazers, opera jackets with frog closures and funnel necks, a hint of what an Uptown Girl might look like if she were designed by someone very, very Downtown. The sexiest look of the night—the one that sent phones flying up—was also the quietest: a black silk kaftan with butterfly sleeves, high at the neck, curving low at the back to skim the tailbone. No theatrics. Just presence.

Whether overt or restrained, the sultry Friday night crowd—Julia Fox, Bebe Rexha, Jenna Lyons, Honey Balenciaga—was fully locked in. “It sounds cheesy,” Cowan said, “but my customers are my favorite people.” They’re in it for the fantasy, for the escape, for the reminder that fashion can still offer something dreamy when the world feels heavy.

Putting it simply—wearing an ICE OUT pin on his polo, like so many designers this week—Cowan summed it up: “It’s probably our least campy collection. Not that I don’t love camp,” he added, quickly. “It just doesn’t feel quite right for the world we’re in right now.”