Milan Fashion Week – Highlights – Part 2 (Marni, Giorgio Armani)

I'm continuing the Milan Fashion Week thread today with more reports from a selection I did for Russian magazine Look At Me (with many thanks to editor Julia Vydolob).

Marni

A Sunday morning catwalk show can be a tricky one especially if random members of the fashion audience may have been partying the night before, but Consuelo Castiglioni at Marni injected in her new collection enough energy to keep her audience awake and to make it fall in love with her new collection.

The secret was almost too easy, though: Castiglioni played with contrasts presenting an innocent young girl clad in strong and sophisticated looks that heavily relied on geometries and sharp dynamic silhouettes.

The opening looks included dresses with organza underkirts at times featuring rigid floral collars characterised by sculptural yet dynamic silhouettes à la André Courrèges.

The ‘60s mood then mixed with graphic motifs, retro flower prints and leather separates with intarsia motifs.

Daisy patterns evoked naive prints, then, little by little, flowers morphed into stylised motifs creating intricate surface elaborations in designs covered in yellow, brown and black embroideries, while bright white dresses decorated with cascades of appliquéd red or yellow sequins and with no emphasis on the waistline reintroduced a certain Courrègesian element.

The final dresses with crocheted zigzagging and intrecciato inserts called back to mind Futurist paintings, while the dresses decorated with large appliquéd snowflake-like flowers injected some glamour in the collection.

Just a few days before Milan Fashion Week started, Estée Lauder announced that its Aramis and Designer Fragrances Division would assume the exclusive worldwide license for a Marni perfume, due next year.

Veronique Gabai-Pinsky, Aramis and Designer Fragrances Global Brand President stated when the announcement was made “wearing Marni is like wearing a piece of art”. In a way that could be the perfect description for this collection.

Giorgio Armani

Sounds of waves crashing and water ripples cascading in the background greeted the audience at Giorgio Armani's catwalk show. Yet, rather than hinting through the water at the sirens walking down the runway, Armani was referring to the fluid fabrics creating liquid effects on the models' bodies.

Wrap shirts were matched with perfectly cut trousers (Armani remains one of the few designers who can still produce perfectly cut and flattering trousers, a rare bird in the contemporary fashion world…), over-the-knee skirts were paired with kimono inspired asymmetrical jackets while details such as pagoda shouders, toggles and obi-like belts called to mind the oriental moods of Armani Privé's Autumn/Winter 2011-12 collection.

The palette mainly revolved around grey, silver and blue, with touches of green, shades evoking the sea, but the translucent effects created by the light reflecting on satin, silk and chiffon revealed the main inspiration behind this collection, mother of pearl.

The latter was echoed in the iridescent striped dresses forming wave-like motifs matched with trousers that elongated the silhouette and in the silvery evening gowns with simple fan-like formations that evoked the shapes of shells.

The show closed with classic evening looks including cropped chic jackets covered in sequins that reproduced the waves of the sea and with a final image of moon over the water (the moon has actually been a constant fixation of Armani for quite a while now, remember for example Armani Privé's Spring/Summer 2010 collection?)

Then three models appeared on the runway donning strapless evening gowns covered in bright white sequins that, rather than mother of pearl, seemed to imitate the effects of rock salt formations on the Dead Sea (the perfect dress for water nymphs à la Ondine? Maybe…).

As a whole, though not extremely original, this was a well balanced and elegant collection, yet the key stood in the fabrics: in a fashion industry that has too often forgotten how important it is to choose the proper textiles to come up with the best designs, Armani's knowledge still remains unsurpassed.

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