Welcome to the Fashion Week Photo Diary, a series where local photographers document the faces, places and parties surrounding their city’s catwalk shows.

Fashion people want you to believe that fashion week is all about the clothes and nothing but the clothes – but we know the real reason they do it. Each season, after every show winds down, the year’s best after parties take place across the city, with actors, models and musicians coming together to celebrate the one thing that binds them all together: fashion. This season, at New York Fashion Week SS26, Dazed party photographer Andrew Tess took his trusty Polaroid camera down to all the best functions, and, as always, celebs were more than happy to pose for a pic and sign their names on the little white strip.

Across the week, Fecal Matter duo Hanna Rose Dalton and Steven Raj Bhaskaran set up shop in Dover Street Market NY to celebrate their debut Matières Fécales collection, joined by Amanda Lepore who performed for the crowd; Luar’s SS26 afterparty included stars like Honey Dijon, Demi Lovato, Lourdes Leon and Omahyra Mota; while more faces were spotted across the shows, like Ella Emhoff at Collina Strada, and cult actress Sophia Lamar at the Ralph Lauren after party.

Arguably the starriest showcase on the NYFW schedule, though, was veteran photographer Mert Alas’s Seventy One Gin soirée at The Manner in SoHo. Where else can you find Hollywood royalty like Salma Hayek, Colman Domingo, Baz Luhrmann and Arian DeBose rubbing shoulders in the corner of the room? Or fashion stars like Aweng Chuol and Marc Forne chilling by the bar? Or FKA twigs and Honey Balenciaga cosying up for a quick snap? At a New York Fashion Week party, that’s where.

Scroll through the gallery above for Andrew Tess’s entire NYFW photo diary