Milan Fashion Week: Dolce & Gabbana and Jil Sander look to their pasts to create a new future
The theme of revisiting past collections seems to be gathering momentum, with more brands harking back to older eras in bid to attract the attention of millennials, while holding on to existing fans
In London and Milan, many brands’ spring-summer collections have been looking to their roots. This could be to sidestep the constant pressure on designers (such as Burberry and J.W. Anderson) to reinvent the wheel each season, to reaffirm a brand’s aesthetic (Gucci and Dolce & Gabbana), or for new design directors to understand the heritage of their roles (Jil Sander).
Dolce & Gabbana
Dolce & Gabbana picked some of their greatest hits from past collections, such as the sensuous la dolce vita black lingerie looks first seen on the original supermodels, the precious baroque embroideries, and the Sicilian fruit and vegetable prints on prom dresses. It was a way of introducing the brand’s signatures to a new millennial audience who probably weren’t even born when Stefano Gabbana and Domenico Dolce sent out their first collections.
Gucci, Prada open Milan Fashion Week with wildly different shows
This season, a secret fashion show for an invited millennial audience was held the night before the main catwalk event to help expose a new generation to the Dolce & Gabbana aesthetic.
