There’s a lot of attention on Zoe Whalen: her brand is one of ten CFDA/Vogue finalists this year. Because her show started almost an hour late, eyes that should have lingered on her wonderful hand crafted designs were instead nervously glancing at the hands of the clock or flashing phone messages. This was an unfortunate turn of events because there was so much forward movement in the spring collection. It felt more about the clothes and less about personal catharsis; it was more edgy than precious or costume-y, and it was easy to imagine many looks being worked into a wardrobe and spotted on the street.

During her recent exhibition at Null Object in Dimes Square, Whalen sold pretty bras and bloomers. These made their way into the collection; a racy thong was revealed by a low-cut apron skirt. More masculine and utilitarian were pants that were loosely based on a vintage Swiss army pair. These featured ZGAW’s signature swirl, which appeared in cut-out and laced form on another pair of jodhpur-like pants with tapered legs that laced at the ankle and which the designer can get made locally—a big deal for Whalen, who is in many ways a one-woman band. “I think by sourcing everything myself, making things in the studio, sewing myself, just being intentional at each step, hand drafting all my patterns, it creates an item that has an energy that can radiate to the customer and start creating positive change,” she said.

Some of the range of her skills was evidenced by a corset that was worlds away from the plate-like armor of fall 2025, being made of a tracery of whisper thin wire from which was suspended at center back a doily made of finest thread. These sartorial cobwebs appeared throughout the collection. Notably they were inset, almost like stained glass windows, on romantic side-draped shepherdess-style dresses with low-dipping backs.

The primness of a collarless check suit was interrupted by a balletic wrap top, and the attached linings of snug jackets peeked out of slits at the back of the arm holes. Look 13, with its high waist and tulle skirt, seemed like it could be worn by a letter day Marie van Goethem, the dancer who posed for Edgar Degas’s sculpture, Little Dancer Aged Fourteen.

Whalen is not a mainstream designer, but someone who moves to her own beat. On her moodboard this season were photos of Comme des Garçons’s Lumps and Bumps show, an activation by Bread & Puppet, a theater/protest group founded in the ’60s, ruffs, and tag sales: the collection was titled Yard Sale Liberation. Bikini Kill was on the soundtrack in the studio and at the show. Activism and performance are central to Whalen’s work. “I’m inspired by Bread & Puppet and Bikini Kill because it feels like they were these artistic forms of resistance that were creating beauty and community that was counter-cultural,” she said. “So much of my practice is building a foundation that challenges our notion of how we can create and interact with clothing and how it can actually be something that’s emotionally sustainable and beautiful.” Whalen’s message is timely; her shows should be too.