On Prada's Instagram page the latest menswear collection by the Italian house was defined as "a power of energy, provocation and freedom".
Showcased in the Silo Hall of Minsheng Wharf, a former 80,000-ton storage warehouse for wheat and grain in Shanghai, Prada's S/S 2020 menswear runway was maybe more interesting for the space where it was presented than for the actual clothes.
A neon light installation traced the lines of Asia's largest silo, a location that looked back at Shanghai's industrial heritage linking it with Prada's Fondazione in Milan and with the label's own passion for industrial and architectural inspirations.
Prada relocated from Milan to Shanghai for this show aiming for a change of scene, but also looking for new strategies to attract more potential consumers from the Asian market, while celebrating the 40th anniversary of Milan being named a sister city of Shanghai.
The collection included functional boxy jackets, knitted sweaters, vests, bowling shirts, short suits and anoraks in neutral and pastel shades (à la Michele De Lucchi, a Prada favourite) that often integrated practical roomy pockets and chunky shoes.
Garments made with iconic Prada nylon and pieces from the revived Linea Rossa will be among the most desirable ones for a younger and hip audience still relatively new to these signature pieces.
Yet nylon and the Linea Rossa weren't the only references to a retro mood: there were also prints that featured cassette tapes, boomboxes, VHS camcorders and floppy disks.
The neon lights and synth soundscapes also pointed at the 80s and called to mind visions from Slava Tsukerman's Liquid Sky (1982) and of radical Italian discos (were the coloured seats references to the interior decor of Turin's Piper, designed by Pietro Derossi, Giorgio Ceretti and Riccardo Rosso?) in some of the older audience members.
Aside from the optimistic and youthful mood, there was something else that connected Prada to the '80s – a jacket covered in rectangular patches with different graphics incorporating the brand's name.
The brightly coloured patches called to mind Fiorucci's iconic stickers for Panini. Packed with Pop Art and Memphis Milano references, when it was first published Fiorucci's album sold around 100 million packets of stickers in just a few months turning into an '80s cult.
If you think about it, there wasn't anything incredible about it, it included indeed a series of stickers based on a series of reiterations, divided in different sections such as Pin-Up, Dance, Romance, Swim or Electron, but the concept was the same as each sticker featured the name of the brand with a graphic design inspired by that specific mood. So there was one concept at the bottom of the sticker album, but it offered infinite variations.
In the jacket featured on Prada's runway, Miuccia Prada did the same: there was an infinite variation of images, but they all revolved around the brand's logo.
There were also some random correspondences between the colours of Prada's jacket and the stickers in the "Electron" section of the Fiorucci album, dedicated to visions of a future merged with retro references.
Bizarrely, even Frankenstein's monster - the inspiration behind Prada's S/S 19 menswear and Pre-Fall 19 collections - appeared in Fiorucci's sticker album, so, who knows, this may not be a random connection after all.
Will Prada ever release its own sticker album maybe with Panini? In a way it would be a reasonable addition to the Pradaverse, indeed it is what's missing in the Pradaverse at the moment – something immediate, iconic, cheap and universal, capable of getting young audiences interested and of generating a fashion frenzy. Somehow you know that collectible stickers would leave young Prada fans as enthusiastic as the Shanghai audience. Food for thought for Miuccia then.
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