We Love the Lady Dior Bag by Sheila Hicks. Here's Why

The Lady Dior handbag is no stranger to being in the spotlight. For years, this prized accessory has garnered eyeballs for its appeal. The Lady Dior bag was born in 1995, almost immediately claiming a spot in the history of fashion. Years later, Princess Diana sported the handbag in Paris. She even took the bag along on an official visit to Liverpool in 1995, and the Met Gala in 1996. Decades later, the Lady Dior Bag remains the fashion house’s eternal design. But Dior's latest iteration—the Lady Dior by Sheila Hicks, under the creative direction of Jonathan Anderson—pushes this icon even further by championing art, sustainability, and conscious luxury.

Sheila Hicks × Dior

Sheila Hicks, the acclaimed American textile artist known for her vibrant, sculptural fibre installations, reimagines the Lady Dior bag through a riot of linen “pony‑tails” and braided fringes. As described during Dior’s Men’s Summer 2026 show, the bag is “cloaked…in a nest of pure linen ponytails,” a nod to Hicks’s signature aesthetic and Anderson’s embrace of unexpected textures and materials. Far from being a conventional luxury accessory, the bag becomes a hand‑crafted artwork woven with threads of conscious intent.

At a reported EUR 16,500 (approximately INR 16,63,600), the Sheila Hicks iteration may seem priced like a collector's art piece. Given its hand-finished, labour-intensive textile detailing, it quite literally bridges the world of fine art and luxury fashion.

Conscious, Creative, Collaborative

The collaboration represents part of a larger movement within luxury fashion: Dior’s Lady Dior Art Project. This initiative, dating back to 2016, invites contemporary artists to reinterpret the iconic bag through their own creative lens. Previously, Faith Ringgold and Jeffrey Gibson collaborated with the French brand.

But Hicks collaboration goes beyond creative aesthetics to bring conscious luxury in its purview, too. By privileging fibre over leather, the partnership foregrounds craftsmanship and tactility, aligning the bag’s value with artisanal labour rather than solely with brand prestige. Each tassel and braid that adorns the bag requires meticulous attention, offering a counter-narrative to the mass-produced fast fashion of today. Luxury is, thus, seen from a new lens—one where sustainable fibres and handcrafted techniques double as components, rather than embellishments.

Add to this the attempt at giving voice to Hicks’ creative legacy and positioning her within Dior’s narrative of thoughtfully-curated products.

Hicks’ works, so far, have incorporated indigenous weaving techniques. The American artist has woven in patterns inspired by her travels to Mexico, France, Morocco, India, Chile, Sweden, Israel, Saudi Arabia, Japan, and South Africa. Such indigenous weaving techniques and local materials left a lasting impression on her artistic philosophy. These experiences became central to her lifelong belief in the expressive potential of textiles, and her works often draw from historical traditions while radically reimagining them for contemporary audiences.

Hicks transforms fibre into a powerful medium for emotional and spatial expression, creating everything from small woven studies to monumental architectural installations. In her collaboration with Dior, Hicks brings her signature approach to the iconic Lady Dior bag, enveloping it in cascades of linen tassels and braided threads. Far from decorative, her intervention redefines the bag as a tactile artwork—celebrating the hand, honouring heritage techniques, and positioning conscious craftsmanship at the heart of contemporary luxury.