The influx of designer debuts at several major houses this season brought a number of spring/summer 2026 bag trends to the fore. “I was interested in that kind of aspect of time and something you cherish,” Matthieu Blazy said of his new takes on Chanel’s iconic 2.55 bags – which were reinforced with wire so that they could be manipulated, giving a warped and aged effect – that he revealed at his debut.
Shop the key bag trends for Spring/Summer 2026:
Dabbling in the accessory archives was, by no surprise, a common theme for newcomers: at Balenciaga, Pierpaolo Piccioli updated the Le City bag; Jonathan Anderson updated the Lady Dior, and Michael Rider brought back Phoebe Philo’s Phantom bag at Celine, complete with curved zips that leant into its “smiley face bag” nickname.
Anderson’s Lady Dior – and the angular top handles he included in his inaugural collection for the house – was one of many new “ladylike” bags to take to the runways. Defined for their slight silhouettes, which riff on 1940s and ’50s purses, with top handles and understated hardware, these styles put a fresh spin on the trad handbag.
Chain-handled silhouettes were another key spring/summer 2026 bag trend to emerge at the shows, seen at Chloé, Ferragamo, Stella McCartney, Valentino, Givenchy and Chanel (the maison is, of course, synonymous with chains, which were also woven into the hemlines of shirts made in collaboration with Charvet.)
Here, Vogue brings a taster of the key spring/summer 2026 trends – to be updated when the new collections arrive in stores.
Fresh takes on archive classics
Creative directors often head to the archives upon their appointment at a new house to ideate new design codes that will mark their tenure, yet there can be a reluctance to mess with the classics too much. Matthieu Blazy’s reinvigorated 2.55 Chanel flap bag retained the iconic quilting and chain handle, but was given new life with structural wire to make it look as if it were frozen in time. At Balenciaga, Pierpaolo Piccioli delivered new Le City bags; at Celine, Michael Rider reintroduced the brand’s famed Phantom, beloved by It-girls in the Noughties, while Jonathan Anderson added contemporary edge to the historic Lady Dior. As the saying goes: if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.
New “ladylike”
In 2025, “ladylike” became a fashion archetype, expressed in dainty gloves, demure over-the-knee dresses and court shoes. A “ladylike” bag, meanwhile, calls to mind purses from the 1940s and ’50s, with rigid bodies and clipper openings, and for 2025, designers presented interpretations that merged the old with the new. Some adopted classic silhouettes: for example, Demna accessorised his collection with the bamboo-handled 1947. Miuccia Prada delivered trad-leaning, croc-embossed top handles at Prada, but at Miu Miu, she gave bags a little more slouch, with pockets for practicality. And at Loewe, Jack McCollough and Lazaro Hernandez brought their vision to the legacy accessories range with new laptop-sized top-handle bags, carried nonchalantly unzipped with the interior anagram visible.
Off the chain
Chain bags have moved in and out of the mainstream over the years. Of course, at Chanel, they’ve been a central design tenet for almost 100 years, but the rise of “quiet luxury” made way for bags with little or no hardware at all. Spring/summer 2026 put chain-handled accessories back on the map in a big way, with new iterations spanning day and evening bags. Chloé’s scrunched leather styles were carried atop the shoulder, Ferragamo debuted a textured tangerine clutch with a chain made from its interlocking Gancini logo, and at Givenchy, Sarah Burton flourished tubular bags with charm-embellished chain handles.
