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It’s Miuccia Prada’s moment. Outside the shows, it seemed as if every other editor or influencer was wearing Prada’s pointy-toed slingbacks, with sheer skirts of the kind seen on last season’s Miu Miu runway close behind. The spring collections for both labels promise to be just as influential.
At Prada, Vogue Runway’s most-viewed show of the season, she and her co-creative director Raf Simons presented a knockout line-up that ranged from the most ethereal of shift dresses in organza and gazar to sturdy cotton barn jackets with worn and frayed edges. If post-show chatter is any indication, we can expect to see many of the latter out and about in 2024. Her Miu Miu message was less about a single item than it was a singular approach to dressing, the more rule-breaking the better. When you start to see vintage frocks tossed over old cashmere sweaters, Miuccia will be the reason.
Sabato De Sarno’s Gucci show on the streets of Brera had to be relocated to the company’s headquarters on account of rain, but the curious turned out in droves to see what the newcomer would get up to. De Sarno wiped the slate clean, offering up a more minimal vision for the Italian brand, one that showcases his pattern-making training and his belief in what he calls a “curated” wardrobe of essentials that still leaves room for play: see the Tom Ford-era Gucci crystal embellished backless top and jeans cut with a covetable slouch.
Milan’s other big debut was Peter Hawkings’s first collection as creative director of Tom Ford. Prior to its sale to the Estée Lauder Companies, the label only occasionally made this ranking in the past. Hawkings’s first outing demonstrated his mastery of Ford’s codes; the louche suiting and the body-con evening were present and correct. His task moving forward will be determining how to engage his audience with collections that break new ground.
Many of the designers in this top 10 list were looking at past seasons to spark ideas for their present ones. Anthony Vaccarello resurrected Yves Saint Laurent’s iconic Saharienne jacket of 1968, stripping away the lacing, he said, because he “wanted to take it all off, to do no more than necessary”. At Chanel, Virginie Viard looked even further back at the summery style of Charles and Marie-Laure Noailles, whose Villa Noailles in Hyères, France, turns 100 this year.
In Milan, Donatella Versace chose her brother Gianni’s autumn 1995 show, and Fendi’s Kim Jones identified Karl Lagerfeld’s spring 1999 collection for the house as their jumping-off points. Clearly, that decade is resonating with Gen Z and millennials too young to have been paying attention the first time around. But for those of us who remember those years, there can be a feeling of creative whiplash.
Fashion can get hemmed in by too much focus on heritage, and that’s one of the reasons we’re all waiting for the end of the month to see what Phoebe Philo does with the launch of her eponymous label. There’s freedom and fun in writing a new history. See the top 10 most-viewed shows of the season below.
10. Versace, rank last season: new entry
9. Miu Miu, rank last season: 4
8. Chanel, rank last season: 8
7. Tom Ford, rank last season: new entry
6. Christian Dior, rank last season: 2
5. Burberry, rank last season: 1
4. Fendi, rank last season: new entry
3. Saint Laurent, rank last season: 6
2. Gucci, rank last season: 5
1. Prada, rank last season: 3
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