Marionettes and Matching Face Masks at Milan Fashion Week

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EQQE9PrcIDo

In New York, fashion was swept off the streets of Manhattan to the Spring Studios rooftop in TriBeCa and far-flung Connecticut lawns, while in London designers like Molly Goddard, Roksanda Ilinčić, and Victoria Beckham dived indoors to art galleries and Gasholders penthouses for appointment shows and virtual presentations, as Burberry and Erdem took to the English countryside to escape the capital smog.

Milan Fashion Week then sought some semblance of normality, with more models on runways and matching face masks elevated to an audience participation event. Street style, a pillar of fashion week just as much as celebrity spotting and the clothes themselves, even made a full-figured comeback.

Fendi and Dolce & Gabbana kicked off the action in front of small socially distanced crowds. Silvia Fendi, in her last show as the brand’s sole designer before Kim Jones takes charge of womenswear, invited guests via monogrammed pasta and her grandmother’s lemon pesto recipe, before unveiling a show rich in scenery, featuring picnic hampers and paper-thin linens printed with blue skies and billowing trees. Dolce & Gabbana layered georgette and chiffon to style out a ‘patchwork of Sicily’.

Back in February, Lombardy was emerging as the epicentre of the growing coronavirus pandemic, as Giorgio Armani pulled the curtain in front of an empty theatre and the fashion world hightailed it from Milan to Paris. In one of fashion’s last flings before the reality of lockdowns and loungewear, Miuccia Prada and Raf Simons sat in plush green armchairs in the Fondazione Prada to announce an unprecedented collaboration.

The fruits of an inevitably compromised first effort were on display in Milan. Clutch coats, full skirts, and satin shift dresses emblazoned with evocative prints adorned a cast of first-time catwalk models, in a show screened virtually via Prada.com. Prada and Simons lingered afterwards to elaborate on their ‘conversation in progress’ by way of a crowd-sourced interview.

Hugo Boss decamped for Milan with languorous tailoring in shades of green and pastel blue, Versace took a deep dive underwater with crumbling columns and employees in the front row, and Tomo Koizumi designed a capsule collection for Emilio Pucci, whose coral ruffle dresses were available by appointment only.

With Moschino populated by marionettes while Giorgio Armani and Maison Margiela opted for digital presentations, it was left to Valentino to close the show. Pierpaolo Piccioli presented his collection in the old industrial space of Fonderie Macchi, where lacework, ruffled blouses, and chiffon dresses butted up against studded bags, short shorts, and tunics to give the brand’s fabled luxury a contemporary utilitarian sheen.