Kendall Jenner takes Manhattan – and the fantasy of having it entirely to herself – in a campaign photographed by Mert Alas, with creative direction by Trey Laird. It is Donna Karan’s love letter to the two muses that built the house: the woman, and the city that made her

There is a particular hour in New York – late, unguarded, almost private – when the streets stop performing, and the skyline feels like it was lit just for you. The limousine glides through it, windows down, headlights catching steel and stone. The song on the radio is INXS’s Never Tear Us Apart, all saxophone ache and slow-burn romance. And in the back seat, wrapped in black cherry velvet and the quiet confidence of a woman who knows exactly where she’s going, is Kendall Jenner – imagining, for one perfect night, that the whole city is hers alone.

That is the scene at the heart of Donna Karan New York’s Fall 2026 campaign, and it arrives with the force of a declaration. For the first time since the brand’s 2024 relaunch, the house has taken its imagery out of the studio and into the streets of New York itself, letting the city’s energy, texture, and shifting light become an extension of the collection. The result is not merely an ad campaign. It is a homecoming.

Donna Karan New York Fall 2026 Campaign Starring Kendall Jenner

Two Muses, One Story

Donna Karan New York has always been defined by two enduring muses: the woman and the city. One shapes the other. The city gives the woman her pace, her nerve, her sense of limitless possibility; the woman gives the city back its glamour, walking its sidewalks as she owns them. When Donna Karan first codified her Seven Easy Pieces in 1985 – a bodysuit, a tailored jacket, a skirt, trousers, a cashmere sweater, a leather piece, an evening look, all designed to carry a woman from day to night and office to after-hours – she wasn’t inventing a wardrobe so much as she was translating the way New York women actually lived. Forty years later, that system still holds. Fall 2026 proves it still thrills.

The campaign pays direct homage to that lineage. Its visual style references a late-1980s Donna Karan film photographed by Dennis Piel and featuring Rosemary McGrotha – a haunting, ahead-of-its-time portrait of a woman voicing her inner thoughts from inside a limousine rolling into Manhattan. That film, startlingly modern even now, introduced the concept: Jenner, alone in the back of a car, crossing a city that seems to exist only for her. Appearing inside and outside the vehicle, she balances edge with glamour, revealing a femininity that is direct, self-possessed, and unmistakably Donna Karan.

“Donna Karan has always embodied confidence and effortless sophistication, qualities I really connect with,” Jenner says of the experience. “Being a part of the Fall 2026 campaign felt like celebrating the energy of New York and a woman who knows her style and embraces who she is.”

The First Layer

The campaign’s true star, beyond the skyline, is a piece from the archives: the iconic bodysuit, reimagined for fall with an extra-wide belt and returned to its rightful place as the first foundation of the System of Dressing. There is something quietly poetic about the choice. The bodysuit was never merely a garment for Donna Karan – born of her own yoga practice, it was the piece around which her entire philosophy of effortless, body-aware dressing was built. To watch Jenner put it on again in 2026 is to see the house reconnect with its founding idea: a woman’s wardrobe should adapt, layer, and move with her from morning meetings to midnight, and true sophistication never requires choosing between comfort and power.

Around that foundation, the collection builds in signature DK rhythm. A draped wool jersey jacket and skirt layered beneath a leather coat. A richly tailored velvet suit, cut with the precision of a handshake and the softness of a secret. A stylized aviator jacket and skirt in deep espresso. A full-length sequin gown that catches the light like wet asphalt after rain – sultry, shimmering, unapologetic.

The Season in Color

If the campaign has a through-line beyond the woman herself, it is color. The season unfolds in a palette of black cherry, deep espresso, and their nocturnal kin – rich, expressive hues drawn from the changing light of New York as summer hands over to fall. Black cherry, the house note, is the shade doing the heaviest lifting: more luscious than oxblood, more intriguing than classic black. It appears on suede ankle-strap sandals, ribbed wool asymmetric knits, velvet blazers, and the flap of a leather shoulder bag, giving the entire season a wine-dark, jewel-toned intimacy. It is the color of the city at that late hour – the hour the campaign is built around.

Texture does the rest. Velvet. Suede. Polished leather. Sculptural gold. The season is a study in tactile contrast, with signature handbags – the Cashmere Tote in chocolate suede, the Black Cherry Leno bag – completing the story, balancing refined craftsmanship with effortless utility. Even the accessories feel like characters: gold cuffs that catch the dashboard light, eyewear that frames a face mid-thought.

A Modern Vision

Behind the lens is Mert Alas, whose instinct for cinematic storytelling and monumental fashion imagery makes him an ideal interpreter of the Donna Karan woman. “Mert Alas is a master of creating a visual world full of cinematic storytelling infused with powerful fashion imagery,” says Trey Laird, the campaign’s creative director. “His images are both instantly iconic as well as timeless and modern, and he perfectly captured Kendall embodying the essence of the Donna Karan woman for today.”

He is not wrong. Jenner – styled by Jessica Diehl, with hair by Chris McMillan and makeup by Mary Phillips – carries the collection with a cool that reads less like performance and more like ownership. She is photographed across the city, the backdrop as much a model as she is: the energy of the streets, the texture of old stone, the late light that makes everything look like a memory in the making. It is a campaign that understands the oldest truth of New York fashion: the city doesn’t dress the woman, and the woman doesn’t dress for the city – the two of them dress each other, endlessly, and have been doing so for four decades.

Launched September 2 across Donna Karan New York’s social channels and amplified through a 360-degree mix of digital, print, and premium outdoor placements, the Fall 2026 campaign is a statement of intent from a house in confident stride. The collection itself is available now on DonnaKaran.com and at select retailers globally.

Some brands photograph a woman in a city. Donna Karan New York photographs the moment a woman realizes the city was always hers – and reminds us, in a season of noise, that the most timeless thing a designer can make is a woman who knows exactly who she is. New York may never sleep. But for one campaign, at least, it holds its breath for her.

Campaign Credits