Editorial Looks for a Consumer World at Gucci
On Wednesday, September 21, Gucci was amongst the design houses to usher in the beginning of Milan Fashion Week. The entire show left an impression of an A-list 1970s night club with smoke filling the pink and red carpeted catwalk. The looks incorporated an Elton John and David Bowie presence with graphics and shimmering, patterned textiles that could have been interpreted as interior design-inspired , something Alessandro Michele is no stranger to in his previous collections. The ruffled, muted gowns were paired with metallic platforms, a steady reoccurring shoe during this entire fashion month.
Although the show and collection were received with lukewarm praise, the designs and styling seemed perfect to walk right off the stage and onto an editorial shoot. But this raises you to question just how an editorial look could sell. Gucci, for its last four collections, has gradually become mundane. Michele produces collections that are becoming expected, putting more emphasis on the garments as art pieces but not sellable. The show seemed to focus more on a feeling created by the atmosphere and clothing than their best sellers—their leather goods. The collection used a great deal of eyewear, but is that where they will be receiving their greatest sales? Gucci is a brand that is steady trying to find a way to stay afloat with a change in voice following their repositioning, but I ask, is conceptual fashion enough to make a sizable profit this quarter.
Michele’s collection, in it’s dreary faced models and stabbed-heart patches, seemed like a freeze-frame on time in a fleeting romance. The delicate, aged fabrics that moved with the models complemented the sparkling crystals embroidered on the dresses and jackets, styled like it was simply thrown together in a deliberate manner. As Gucci Mane, a rapper and Gucci enthusiast who also reviewed the collection, so eloquently put it, “The color hard. The print hard.” The show was painted as the end of a brief-one-night hook up that most us found some sort of relation to and Gucci is letting us pick up the pieces.
