The designer of the fan-favorite California lifestyle brand opens up to L&rsquo;OFFICIEL about feeling &ldquo;less pressure&rdquo; this time around.

It&rsquo;s been 14 years since Jenni Kayne last presented at <a href="https://www.lofficielusa.com/fashion-week/all-the-nyfw-shows-gen-z-is-most-excited-for" target="_blank" rel="noopener">New York Fashion Week</a>. But on Friday night, the California-based designer returned to the East Coast to show her Spring/Summer 2026 collection with an immersive presentation at her brand&rsquo;s SoHo store. With guests on hand including Martha Stewart, Carolyn Murphy, Kelly Rutherford, Rachel Zoe, and Whitney Port, it was a milestone that called for celebration. &ldquo;It feels really exciting to come back and showcase the entire lifestyle,&rdquo; Kayne tells L&rsquo;OFFICIEL. &ldquo;There's such a big and intense energy in New York that we don't have in LA, so it&rsquo;s fun.&rdquo;&nbsp;
Kayne partnered with stylist Kate Young for the NYFW experience. Titled &ldquo;Grounded,&rdquo; it seamlessly blends the brand&rsquo;s nature-inspired wardrobe and interior offerings. &ldquo;I wanted to do something that was really immersive and kind of encompassed the entire lifestyle,&rdquo; says Kayne, who plans to host pop-ups in the transformed space over the next month. &ldquo;All of the furniture you see is custom&mdash;there are a lot of special little details, like a beautiful handpainted credenza&mdash;to go along with the clothes. It's all one world, and I feel like people can really touch, and feel, and get it.&rdquo;&nbsp;
Get it, they certainly do. Since launching her namesake label at just 19 years old in 2002, Kayne, now 42, has garnered a cult-like following thanks to her blog, <a href="https://www.jennikayne.com/blogs/ripandtan">Rip &amp; Tan</a>, and her laidback yet elevated aesthetic. Her business has also expanded beyond the fashion realm to incorporate interior design, a subject on which she&rsquo;s written two books (a third will be published in February); last year, she also ventured into the hospitality realm with the opening of the <a href="https://www.jennikayne.com/pages/the-farmhouse?srsltid=AfmBOoohO8Tful_LYl_FNVHeWud7Dc0IhozxO2X22LrI8VfDzYQ2TtWF">Jenni Kayne Farmhouse</a>, an impossibly chic Upstate New York retreat. Today, fans flock to Kayne&rsquo;s luxe cashmere sweaters and classic neutral staples as much as they do her home decor offerings&mdash;and it&rsquo;s that very clientele that has remained Kayne&rsquo;s top priority since day one.&nbsp;

Jenni Kayne Spring/Summer 2026 collection. Photography by Yvonne Tnt/BFA, courtesy of Jenni Kayne.

&ldquo;We love having our own retail stores because we really get to hear from our customers,&rdquo; she says, explaining how the brand delivers on such feedback. &ldquo;Lately, our customers have been wanting more color. And while our bread and butter is neutrals, it's nice to give a pop of seasonal color here and there. Because I really want to give my customers what they want.&rdquo; The SS26 collection features the label&rsquo;s signature seasonless styles, with elevated knits and timeless silhouettes in bold hues&mdash;including those that have been most requested by customers. &ldquo;I feel like reds and tomatoes have been really big, so I'm excited about this new red that we have,&rdquo; she says. &ldquo;And then yellow, too. But green and blue always do well for us, so I don't know! There are so many different options.&rdquo;&nbsp;
Keep reading for our full conversation with Kayne about her return to <a href="https://www.lofficielusa.com/fashion-week/new-york-fashion-week-parties-spring-summer-2026" target="_blank" rel="noopener">NYFW</a>, what it represents for the brand&rsquo;s future, and why she has no interest in designing clothes just &ldquo;for art&rsquo;s sake.&rdquo;

Jenni Kayne x Kate Young. Photography by Angi Welsch, courtesy of Jenni Kayne.

L&rsquo;OFFICIEL: What inspired the Spring/Summer 2026 collection?&nbsp;
JENNI KAYNE: The collection&rsquo;s definitely always inspired by nature, and for spring it&rsquo;s really rooted in this idea of a fresh beginning and everything springing up from your garden. Bolder, softer colors. New beginnings. Very clean and simple. But definitely poppier than it normally is.&nbsp;
L&rsquo;O: Speaking of new beginnings, this does feel like a new chapter that you're back at NYFW. What does that symbolize for the brand in a larger sense?&nbsp;
JK: I feel like it's a culmination of the last 14 years and all the work we&rsquo;ve put into the brand. We&rsquo;re definitely a quintessential California brand, but we have a big East Coast presence. We probably have more stores in New York than we have in LA. So it was nice to be able to do something here.
L&rsquo;O: How do you think NYFW has changed since the last time you were here?&nbsp;
JK: Well, I feel so out of the loop, that I don't know that I even know [laughs]. But I feel like for me, it's changed in that it isn't a pressure cooker anymore. This was something I chose to do. It was exciting. I am doing it in a different way, and it feels like less pressure. When I used to show here, it was like, if you had a show in New York, you had to be on style.com and vogue.com in order to get press, and stylists, and wholesale accounts. And I really pulled back from all of that and focused on opening my own retail, building out my core assortments, and building my business into what you see today.

Jenni Kayne NYFW Spring/Summer 2026 event. Photography by Yvonne Tnt/BFA, courtesy of Jenni Kayne.

L&rsquo;O: And there wasn't really social media last time, so it&rsquo;s a very different world now.
JK: No, there wasn't at all! It&rsquo;s totally different, but still with so many of the same faces and editors.&nbsp;
L&rsquo;O: What do you love most about NYFW? Does it inspire your own sense of style at all?
JK: I don't know that it inspires my sense of style, but I feel like when you live in LA, you're in a car all the time. So it is really fun to be in a city where everyone's walking around and like the amount of style and fashion that I'm seeing, whether good or bad, is incredible. Like, I love it. I love that people own their vibe and their sense of style and go for it.&nbsp;
L&rsquo;O: You have a very dedicated following that&rsquo;s become a community of its own. What has been most important to you in cultivating and growing that?&nbsp;
JK: Yeah. I think saying true to myself and really staying the course and being patient. But I always say being as close to my customers as possible is the most important thing I could do. Because I really want to create beautiful clothes that women want to wear. I don't want to just make clothes for art&rsquo;s sake.&nbsp;
L&rsquo;O: How do you describe the Jenni Kayne aesthetic?&nbsp;
JK: Rooted in California. Always branded in nature. Effortless with ease, but put together.&nbsp;
L&rsquo;O: Has the ethos of the brand evolved at all?
JK: 100 percent. I always wanted to have a lifestyle business, but I was never able to go into all of the categories. So the brand has definitely grown. If you follow the trajectory of my life, I started when I was 19 and everything was about fashion. I saw the bigger picture, but it wasn&rsquo;t until I became a wife and had my own home that I got into interiors and entertaining, and then I had my first child and I got into wellness and what I was putting in and on my body that I kind of put it all together. I feel like as I've grown up, like honed in on my aesthetic even more. The DNA has always been the same, but the brand has grown up with me.&nbsp;

Jenni Kayne. Photography by Angi Welsch, courtesy of Jenni Kayne.

L&rsquo;O: To you, who is the Jenni Kayne woman?&nbsp;
JK: I'm probably the worst person at answering that&hellip;because it's me, it's my mom, who's in her 70s, and it's everybody in between. It's a woman who wants to feel beautiful in her home and in her clothes, and wants to live with a sense of ease but also feel put together and timeless at the same time.&nbsp;
L&rsquo;O: What do you think she's reaching for in her closet every day?&nbsp;
JK: Cashmere sweaters, for sure. The <a href="https://www.jennikayne.com/collections/the-cocoon-cardigan">Cocoon</a>, the <a href="https://www.jennikayne.com/collections/the-fisherman">Fisherman</a>, the <a href="https://www.jennikayne.com/collections/the-flynn-sweater">Flynn</a>.&nbsp;
L&rsquo;O: For someone who&rsquo;s considering entering the Jenni Kayne world for the first time, what would you say is the ultimate intro piece?&nbsp;
JK: I think there are a couple of options. The <a href="https://www.jennikayne.com/products/everyday-sweater-taupe">Everyday Sweater</a> is our entry price point. The <a href="https://www.jennikayne.com/products/simone-v-neck-doe">Simone V-Neck</a> is just above that&mdash;it is a great option. If you want a cashmere sweater, the Flynn v-neck is a lower price point than the Cocoon or Fisherman, but delicious.

Guests at the Jenni Kayne NYFW Spring/Summer 2026 event. Photography by Yvonne Tnt/BFA, courtesy of Jenni Kayne.

L&rsquo;O: Looking ahead, what are your hopes for the brand&rsquo;s future?&nbsp;
JK: I feel like I'm really living in the moment. But definitely excited for my third book with Rizzoli, which is coming out in February. It&rsquo;s called <a href="https://www.rizzolibookstore.com/product/pacific-natural-everywhere">Pacific Natural Everywhere</a>, and it's about this idea of California living anywhere you go. It's how architecture and nature have a relationship together in this idea of indoor-outdoor living. So I'm very excited about that. And then also we're launching International shipping and just expanding internationally. We&rsquo;re doing a pop-up in Selfridge&rsquo;s right now and we&rsquo;re doing some really cool activations in London.
L&rsquo;O: Thinking back to when you launched, did you ever imagine how massive the brand would become?&nbsp;
JK: I think my dreams were as big, and my ambitions. But no. I'm really, I'm really proud of the brand that we've built.

After 14 Years Away, Jenni Kayne Marks Her Return to New York Fashion Week

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