Kinda shocked how menswear heavy this was, it can almost qualify as a actual menswear show with some womens looks in between.
Don't you find that this strictly merchandise driven kind of way of designing is getting very boring?
I want a bit of narrative and story telling. I don't need everything to be a total McQueen or Galliano fantasia, but wouldn't it be nice to feel something from a show/collection again? To feel transported somewhere?
BOFThe men’s collection Michele is showing actually began with a vision of Madonna, a uniquely modern Olympian, photographed at a Lakers’ game in 1993 in an Adidas dress by curator Laura Whitcomb, who forged a connection between the art and fashion worlds in the early ‘90s with a label called Label. Michele was mesmerised by the fact this was something happening in the street and under the radar in fashion years ago. And somehow that connected with his love of doing the wrong things in the right way. Hence, a men’s show during women’s fashion week. “I don’t want to say to break the rules because it’s nothing really specific, but I was thinking it was just a good moment to open the conversation about men in a moment when the industry and the audience usually see another kind of show.”
There is another point that Michele particularly wants to make. As a pioneer of gender fluidity in fashion, he has become increasingly dismayed by the way that those words — along with terms like diversity and inclusivity — have increasingly become a marketing tool, an Instagram caption for companies, destroying the power of the words themselves. “I grew up feeling myself a special boy in a different world. But everything I did had a very deep meaning. Diversity is essential, but I want to feel the real meaning of the words.”
Michele reminds me that his epochal first show for Gucci in January 2015 was a men’s show and he wasn’t thinking about “fluidity.” Now as then, he insists he still has a passion for men’s suiting. “That is something that I really love. When I started a collection, I start with the suit, also with women. It’s always about the jacket and the shoulder. So I didn’t start my career thinking about ‘fluidity’, never in my life. I started always with the relation to the face, the body. Attitude.”
WWDNow it was Gucci’s turn. Michele introduced a collaboration with Adidas that may be his largest yet, mixing streetwear with Italian sartorial tradition to create elevated track suit suits that should send hype beasts into orbit. Not to mention nudge them to dress up a bit more. If this is a season about power tailoring, Michele figured out how to serve it up to sneakerheads.
“The idea was to break the codes of sportswear,” he said, sharing that the collection will be sold through pop-ups worldwide, which he helped to design.
More than just slapping an Adidas logo on T-shirts and hoodies, as some others have done, Michele mixed the codes of Adidas with those of Gucci, achieving something elevated and elegant, akin to his Balenciaga Hacking Project.
A cornerstone of the collection was a red track dress, inspired by a do-it-yourself Adidas dress made by Los Angeles designer Laura Whitcomb of the ’90s era brand Label, and worn by Madonna in 1993.
“She did something in my blood years ago…and she is now part of my work because I met her in an image,” Michele said. (Whitcomb, now an art curator, was a guest of the house at the show, where she reminisced about blending high and low culture and how that spirit is reverberating on the streets today.)
Also luxe casual was a royal blue corduroy suit, beautifully tailored with broad shoulders, a double-breasted blazer emblazoned with the Adidas trefoil leaf logo on the breast pocket, trousers with the athletic giant’s signature side stripes, worn with a leather necktie and bamboo handbag.
More than sneakers, although there were some of those, too, the trefoil stripes and leaves adorned high-heel brogues and boots, bamboo totes, silk scarves, berets and double-billed baseball hats. They trimmed a green overcoat, a cream mohair ski bunny sweater knit set, and were mixed together with GGs to make a graphic, op-art print. There was even a tricked out Adidas Victorian white satin gown.
“We share the stripes, the webbing — that can’t be too similar,” Michele said, hinting at the possibility that rather than fighting over a trademark, the brands may have joined together, similar to the way Gucci turned Dapper Dan into a collaborator. “We also share the idea of sport that’s chic, and it opened up a conversation,” the designer said.
Gimmicky, maybe, but a lot of it looked really great — and rich, conjuring images of Spike Lee decked out courtside, of Richie Tenenbaum’s sweatband wearing style, IRL stylish sportsmen like Stan Smith and…”Squid Game.”
FASHION NETWORK"In terms of absolute value, it’s always been very important, but the men's fashion market has grown significantly in the last few years. We think that at Gucci and at Saint-Laurent, there is a very large potential for expanding the menswear offering. We had focused more on womenswear during the maturity stages of the different houses. This was our priority, and it went extremely well. But given what the men's market has become, we think we have a very good growth potential to go after. Balenciaga has benefited from this market in recent years, an experience we’ve had within the group. I believe that in Gucci and Saint Laurent we can significantly rebalance the menswear and womenswear offerings.”