NEW YORK (AP) — Arriving at Ralph Lauren’s latest runway show on Wednesday, Oprah Winfrey reminisced about a big purchase she made long ago, once she started earning enough money to pay rent and have some left over.
“My first big splurge was Ralph Lauren towels,” Winfrey said. She added she’d even showed them off to Barbara Walters when the newswoman came to her house. “I said, ‘Do you want to see my Ralph Lauren towels?’
“Growing up for me, he was the standard,” Winfrey added, “not just for dressing, but for home life and for what it meant to be surrounded by beauty and excellence and form and structure, and appreciating everything about your own life.”
Winfrey came to Lauren’s show Wednesday for the first time since he took over Central Park for a lavish 50th anniversary extravaganza in 2018. There, she had toasted him for half a century “of designing our dreams.”
Wednesday’s show was what Lauren calls one of his intimate ones, using his own design studio on Madison Avenue, decorated cleanly and sparely with white couches. Still, “intimate” for the 85-year-old designer still means fans lined up five rows deep outside the building, eager to snap photos of celebs like Winfrey and her friend Gayle King, Nick Jonas, Usher, Laura Dern, Mindy Kaling, Naomi Watts and many others.
What guests inside saw was a Spring 2026 collection that leaned strongly into Lauren’s signature menswear-for-women look, with roomy but tailored jackets open to reveal bralette tops, paired with wide trousers or skirts. The key color for jackets and coats was crispy white, as in the very first item, a long white polo coat open to reveal a black bra top with black trousers.
The color palette was mainly white and black — accented with red. Sometimes the red was just in a bow around the neck. There were also a few dresses in brilliant red — one more casual, with spaghetti straps, and another lush, strapless silky gown to close out the show. As for accessories, many of the ensembles were accented with chunky silver pendants, and some with huge floppy hats.
Kaling said Lauren’s work had been important to her immigrant family.
“His vision was very emblematic (of) the American dream for my parents, who are immigrants,” Kaling said. “Particularly my dad, wearing the polo symbol was so like the sign of making it.”
On the sidelines of the show, David Lauren, the brand’s chief branding and innovation officer as well as Ralph Lauren’s son, reflected on a moment of pride for the label — the engagement of Taylor Swift to Travis Kelce, with Swift wearing a casual striped Polo Ralph Lauren dress in photos she posted on Instagram.
“We’re always proud to work with Taylor,” David Lauren said. “She’s worn our clothes for years, and to be part of a romantic moment in her life, it’s a great moment for us.”