‘White gold' was the name given to linen from St Gallen, a Swiss city synonymous with fabric production since medieval times. Then, the monks of the local abbey had found that the region's climate provided the perfect conditions for growing flax, the plant that provides the fibres from which linen is woven; in the centuries since, embroidery became its primary trade, with tens of thousands of people employed in its production at the turn of the 19th century.
It was here that, in 1922, the 26-year-old Alice Kriemler-Schoch opened an atelier producing aprons adorned with polka dot embroidery or lace trims, but also heavier-duty styles that dressed local factory workers. In 1944, her son Max Kriemler joined the business, renaming it Akris (an acronym of sorts for his mother's name) and expanding into ready-to-wear. By the 1970s, Akris was creating clothing and fabrics for Parisian houses including Givenchy, Saint Clair and Ted Lapidus, who used Max and his wife Ute's expertise to manufacture their own burgeoning ready-to-wear collections.
Akris is now a fashion house in its own right, showing twice-yearly at Paris Fashion Week and led by Max Kriemler's son Albert, who is the creative director. Fabric remains at the heart of the Akris project; Albert Kriemler's collections, which are defined by a precise, largely minimalist aesthetic, are enlivened by moments of craft and textile manipulation. ‘A hundred years ago, my grandmother Alice set out to define a woman's presence and enhance her charisma, and that very much remains my mission today,' he said in 2022 on the occasion of Akris' 100th anniversary.
Art is another fascination of Albert Kriemler; he counts works by the likes of Ursula Schulz-Dornburg, Lawrence Weiner, Paul Thek and Ian Hamilton Finlay as part of his personal collection, and has collaborated with numerous others on the runway (notably Thomas Ruff, Ugo Rondinone and Geta Brătescu). ‘Since I started working on artist-inspired collections, I always challenge myself to do exactly that,' he says. ‘Not just to depict an artist's work on fabrics, but to translate it with full respect for the artist and the woman wearing it, while bringing my own interpretations to it.’
His latest collaboration, part of an A/W26 collection shown in March in Paris, provided a fresh challenge: namely, that the artist in question, Olga de Amaral, works in textile (a first for the brand). ‘Because textile is already her medium, I was less interested in translating her work literally than in exploring her intuitive approach to materials,’ he says, noting a similarity in their method that extends beyond the medium. ‘She once said, “The mind was following, not guiding.” That felt very familiar to me. My own creative process also begins with intuition.’
‘Fabric has always been my language. Every collection begins with the material in my hand'
Albert Kriemler
De Amaral is best known for her large-scale abstract works, which see fabrics such as horsehair, wool and linen gilded with gold leaf and gesso before being manipulated into abstract forms that resemble rock faces (other works feature elements of weaving or colourful ‘streamers' of fabric). Albert Kriemler says he had ‘admired Olga's work for years', though the impetus for the collection came from viewing a retrospective of her work at the Fondation Cartier in Paris, which ran from 2024-2025. From there, he took a trip to de Amaral's studio in Bogotá, Colombia, where she lives and works.
‘What stayed with me was Olga's rootedness in Bogotá and her idea of the casa as a place apart from the usual cultural capitals,' he says. ‘That continuity carries into her studio, where she has worked with the same seven assistants for more than 30 years: “seven lives, 14 hands,” as she calls them. I know that dynamic well. Many of my tailors and pattern-makers have been with me for more than two decades. Their command of cut and experience, construction and cloth is central to my work.'
In the collection itself, Kriemler evoked works from de Amaral's Alquimia series, begun in the 1980s and recognisable for its gleaming metallic surfaces. They inspired the collection's molten gold fabrics, such as in the ‘shimmering brocade' coats. Her knotted Nudo and Lienzo series are evoked with dramatic fringing, while a gold-and-black cape coat, for which Akris developed a soft brocade, woven with textured foil tape that fractures the surface, echoes ‘Olga's approach to weaving and fibre manipulation'.
As for working with de Amaral, Kriemler praises her as ‘humble and modest, [but with] a real presence. She lets her work speak. We spent three hours together every day, talking, and she told me that threads have always been at the heart of everything she does. I was especially touched to learn that she has always made fabrics for her friends, so they could sew them into dresses and wear them.’
‘Fabric has always been my language,' he continues. ‘Every collection begins with the material in my hands. That is when the creative process starts: the fabric tells you what it wants to become. I call it the eyes in my fingers. Olga works in a similar way – threads are the foundation of her art.’
The A/W 2026 collection is available at akris.com.
A version of this article appears in the November 2026 Art Issue of Wallpaper*, available from 8 October in print on newsstands, on the Wallpaper* app on Apple iOS, and to subscribers of Apple News +. Subscribe to Wallpaper* today