---
title: "Iris van Herpen exhibit coming to Brooklyn Museum this spring"
url: https://www.voxelmatters.com/iris-van-herpen-exhibit-brooklyn-museum-spring/
date: 2026-01-30
modified: 2026-01-30
lang: en
author: "Tess Boissonneault"
description: "The work of Dutch designer Iris van Herpen will soon be spotlighted at a dedicated exhibition at the Brooklyn Museum in New York. The exhibition, called Iris van Herpen: Sculpting..."
categories:
  - "Art"
  - "Consumer Products"
  - "Entertainment"
  - "Fashion"
tags:
  - "future"
image: https://www.voxelmatters.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/IVH-sculptingthesenses-640x456.jpeg
word_count: 510
---

# Iris van Herpen exhibit coming to Brooklyn Museum this spring

The work of Dutch designer Iris van Herpen will soon be spotlighted at a dedicated exhibition at the Brooklyn Museum in New York. The [exhibition](https://www.brooklynmuseum.org/exhibitions/iris-van-herpen), called *Iris van Herpen: Sculpting the Senses, *will display over 140 of van Herpen's haute couture creations—made using myriad digital technologies—and explore the relationship between the body, clothing, technology, and space.

Van Herpen is best known for her innovative use of technology in the [creation of avant-garde fashion](https://www.voxelmatters.com/category/3d-printed-consumer-products/fashion/), such as dresses made from laser cut and screen-printed fabrics, garments embedded with high-voltage generators, and 3D printed wearables with unique forms and textures. Her pieces, which have been worn by artists and celebrities including Beyoncé, Björk, Cate Blanchett, Miley Cyrus, Lady Gaga, and Ariana Grande, are broadly recognized to be leading haute-couture into the future.

[![Iris van Herpen Sculpting the Senses](https://www.voxelmatters.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/IVH06-LRG-258x340.jpg)](https://www.voxelmatters.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/IVH06-LRG.jpg)(Iris van Herpen)
The Brooklyn Museum’s upcoming exhibition will showcase a range of Iris van Herpen’s designs alongside artworks by contemporary artists like Philip Beesley, Rogan Brown, and Casey Curran among others, as well as scientific artefacts and the organic materials that have inspired van Herpen in her oeuvre.

“In this way, the exhibition reveals the experimental spirit that has reshaped 21st-century fashion,” the Brooklyn Museum states. “Van Herpen’s designs draw on biomimicry, fractal geometry and mathematics, and neuroscience, transforming cutting-edge discoveries into sculptural gowns and ethereal fabrics.”

This is not the first time that van Herpen's designs will have been featured in a high-profile exhibition: in 2015, the MET's Costume Institute acquired the two-piece Skeleton dress, from the designer's Fall 2011 *Capriole *collection. This dress, constructed using 3D printing and nylon, was the institute's first 3D printed garment and has raised questions and challenges about the nature of conserving a non-fabric garment. (You can read more about this in a [very interesting essay on The MET website.](https://www.metmuseum.org/essays/skeleton-dress)) The *Sculpting the Sens*es exhibition has also been shown twice before in Europe.

[![Iris van Herpen Shift Souls 3D print](https://www.voxelmatters.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/TEN0163-XL-227x340.jpg)](https://www.voxelmatters.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/TEN0163-XL.jpg)3D printed face jewelry for the *Shift Souls Collection*

Looking specifically at her 3D printed pieces, van Herpen has worked closely with 3D printing service [Materialise](https://www.voxelmatters.directory/company/materialise/) and has generally used nylon material and selective laser sintering (SLS) to bring her cutting-edge designs to life. In 2010, for instance, van Herpen collaborated with Materialise on the *Crystallization* Collection; in 2011, the partners leveraged 3D printing to bring a number of pieces in her *Escapism *Collection to life. She has also explored other 3D printing processes, like Mammoth SLA, as well as a variety of finishing techniques in her design process.
In 2019, van Herpen explored another use for 3D printing: she created a series of [3D printed face jewelry](https://www.voxelmatters.com/shift-souls-iris-van-herpen-3d-print/) for her *Shift Souls* collection's runway debut in Paris. The cage-like pieces, named *Cellchemy*, were customized to the models using 3D scanning and were 3D printed using a high-resolution multi-material 3D printer.

The Brooklyn Museum in New York will host the North American debut for *Iris van Herpen: Sculpting the Senses* from May 16–December 6, 2026. The exhibition has already been held in Paris at the Musée des Arts Décoratifs and at the Kunsthal Museum in Rotterdam.