Gucci Spring 2025 Women’s Ready-to-Wear: Will It Be Enough?
Creative director Sabato De Sarno stayed the course, showing more Ancora red leather, sporty tailoring, lingerie looks, horsebit accessories and nods to famous Gucci customer of yore Jacqueline Kennedy.
By Booth Moore
September 20, 2024, 11:49am
Will it be enough to excite the flagging luxury consumer?
That was the question after watching the spring 2025 Gucci show Friday afternoon at the Triennale. Challenging environment aside, the brand flexed, putting on a massive production with a crowd outside as far as the eyes could see gathered for a glimpse of the red carpet.
Inside, Daisy Edgar-Jones and Dakota Johnson were twinning in cream lace, and François-Henri Pinault was all smiles posing with Jin from BTS. The show opened with a backbeat that had Mark Ronson’s toes tapping along with everyone else’s; it should have, he mixed it.
On the runway, a year after taking the helm of the Kering-owned label, which went from cash cow to seeing significant losses, creative director Sabato De Sarno stayed the course, reasserting his codes for the house, and the codes that came before him, while showing a lot of accessories. A lot.
He was going for “casual grandeur” he said during a preview, where street-style photos picturing the disarming elegance of Jacqueline Kennedy, with her oversize sunglasses and Gucci hobo in tow, were on his mood board.
The term “casual grandeur” was actually first used by British Prime Minister Harold Macmillan to describe the iconic first lady’s ability to combine European sophistication with American ease, and it resonated with De Sarno “because I love to make clothes for people, for real life, to see my clothes on people,” he said.
The approach saw him cut easy sportswear pieces in gray menswear fabric, such as a zip-front jacket and slit-front trousers over sneakers, as well as peppy horsebit jacquard blouson and miniskirt sets. He reasserted his tailoring skills with 1960s-looking rounded jackets, pencil skirts and a slim coat with clever cutout and tie details, and the ladylike raffia suiting conjured Frida Giannini’s Gucci era. He also continued his streak of taking everyday outerwear and making it extraordinary, as seen in a gorgeous olive overcoat with green metallic fringe snaking down the front.
Lingerie-inspired lace slipdresses made an encore appearance, too, as well as glossy leather in Ancora red and lime green with Mod or biker flourishes, building to a finale of statement coats, including a trench à la Jackie, worn with baggy jeans and a Gucci red-and-green-trimmed tank top, a GG belt and silk scarf.
The accessories were plenty visible, with the 1947 Bamboo bag front and center done in a new East-West version, a clutch, and as a mini bracelet bag. Several of the runway bags were customized by contemporary Japanese artists.
The bamboo motif was also abundant in necklaces, bracelets and the bamboo collars and metal details incorporated into sexy jersey halter gowns inspired by Tom Ford’s 1990s Gucci interpretations of 1970s Halston.
De Sarno continued to run with the house horsebit, which he’s evolved from a platform to a ballerina and now to a 1960s-inspired tall second-skin boot. And in addition to dozens of permutations of the Jackie bag, he brought back the Gucci 1973 bucket shape from the archives with a horsebit on its side.
There were also sunglasses, sun hats and scarves, so much product that one wondered if the marketing folks went a little too wild in search of the sale.
When I asked about his impact and what customers have been buying, De Sarno said he has been delighted to see Ancora red go global, with people wearing it even when it’s not Gucci. He also joked that he was onto Charli XCX’s Brat green first.
De Sarno has conviction, and when given enough time, that has worked magic at other houses with image-altering creative directors, such as Celine with Hedi Slimane. His classic, casual pieces like Gucci jeans and tank tops, leather blousons and shorts can fit into many wardrobes, too. But does his vision make you dream and dream and dream enough to want to buy? Still TBD. The impromptu dance party that broke out on the runway after the show sure thought so, however, and that’s something.
