More is the new less

Milan

The pictures say it all. For spring/summer 2011, designers in Milan are encouraging us to be bold and daring, and to embrace bright colours. After last season's onslaught of minimalism, designers have updated the look with a flash of DayGlo orange, shocking pink, blue or yellow, transforming clean, simple lines into something more interesting.

The Italians love colour and, therefore, presented an optimistic, upbeat message at Milan Fashion Week - but in a controlled way, through the use of solid, saturated colour blocks, occasionally in clashing combinations.

There was much talk of Yves Saint Laurent's ghost hanging over the colour palettes. And whether or not they visited his recent retrospective in Paris, it certainly encouraged designers such as Miuccia Prada, Raf Simons at Jil Sander and Frida Giannini at Gucci to experiment.

There are not many designers confident enough to combine ultraviolet with neon orange for a sporty jacket and long sack dress, as seen at Jil Sander, but the hues are actually complementary opposites in the colour spectrum.

Prada also played with combinations, working hot pink and orange with black to dazzling effect in a bandbox stripe on a peplum-hemmed dress and then accessorising it with a wacky cartoon-coloured fox stole.

There were also some zany touches, such as the banana-print shirt and skirt and the monkeys swinging on baroque frames of greenery. Nevertheless, Prada carefully kept the shapes fairly loose and graphic.