Styling · The Kaftan
Resort Energy, City Hours
The kaftan is no longer a beach cover-up. It is the piece you wear from a late lunch to a candlelit dinner — and this season, it is defined entirely by colour.
The kaftan is no longer a beach cover-up. It is the piece you wear from a late lunch to a candlelit dinner — and this season, it is defined entirely by colour.
There is one silhouette dominating 2026, and it is the kaftan. Once relegated strictly to the beach, the ancient garment has undergone a full fashion renaissance — fluid, forgiving, and endlessly elegant, it has become the single most versatile thing a woman can pack.
What has changed is the intent. The modern kaftan is a day-to-night piece: thrown over swimwear at noon, belted and gilded by evening, carried straight from the resort into the city without a single change of register. The editors are unanimous — the beautifully dressed woman this season isn't packing more, she's packing better, and the kaftan is her hero piece.
The simplest way to choose one is by colour. Below, the kaftan in every shade — the white, the neutral, the pastel, the black and the printed — thirty pieces, from breezy cotton to Loro Piana's finest. The chicest way to wear it, as ever: let the colour do the talking.
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The purest, most versatile of them all — white is the kaftan at its most effortless, elegant without trying too hard. Lisa Marie Fernandez's hooded gauze and Eres's crisp cotton carry from morning swim to evening terrace with nothing more than a change of sandal.
This is the season's quiet-luxury direction — butter, ivory, sand and warm brown replacing the loud brights of summers past. Loro Piana's cotton and Johanna Ortiz's voile are the pieces you pack when you intend to look expensive and say nothing at all.
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Soft colour with a gentle pop — blush, sky blue, citrus yellow and a whisper of green. Camilla's crystal-embellished silk and Emporio Sirenuse's Jenna bring the daytime-event energy: refreshing, feminine, and made for golden hour.
The after-dark kaftan — the one that trades breezy for striking. The Attico's zebra-print and Ola by Ohaila Khan's fringed sequins prove that black, belted and embellished, is the fastest way to take the silhouette from the beach straight into the evening.
The hero piece — big romantic blooms, bold stripes and artisanal prints in full colour. Missoni's metallic crochet, La DoubleJ's silk twill and Johanna Ortiz's painterly cotton are the statement kaftans that command a room the moment you walk in.
A kaftan is only as good as what you wear it with. The styling is simple: let the footwear set the hour, carry raffia by day, and add gold at the throat when the sun goes down.
Footwear sets the hour. A flat leather flip-flop or chain sandal keeps the kaftan easy by day; the fishnet or embellished pair takes it into the evening. Let the shoe decide the register.
Nothing says resort like woven straw. A raffia shoulder bag or basket is the piece that finishes the daytime kaftan — carried to lunch, to the market, to the beach club and back.
The finishing move. A cord-and-gold pendant, a pearl strand or a sculptural leather-and-gold piece is what turns the kaftan from beach cover-up into evening dress. One necklace, and the whole look shifts.
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Every piece in this edit, by the houses behind it. Explore them all.
Pack better, not more — and let one flowing piece carry you from the resort to the city, from noon to midnight.— ESVRA