Fashioning the Future
ALESSANDRO MICHELE SHAKES UP THE INDUSTRY ONCE AGAIN AS HE REIMAGINES FASHION SHOWS AND SEASONS AT GUCCI. BY JEFFREY YAN
Last May, Alessandro Michele made waves when he announced that Gucci will be leaving the traditional fashion calendar to work with new rhythms and formats. The fruits of that decision were unveiled to the world in November and the results were seismic. While other brands experimented with fashion films, Michele took the idea to a whole other level—putting together a weeklong virtual film festival dubbed GucciFest that not only showcased the new Gucci collection, but also spotlighted the works of 15 young designers alongside conversations between art and fashion luminaries. To embark on this epic journey, Michele enlisted the help of cult favourite filmmaker Gus Van Sant, of MyOwn Private Idaho fame. Together, the two turned Rome into their playground and stage. The result of their 20-day shoot: Ouverture of Something that Never Ended, an episodic film released over the course of seven days. The idea for this unprecedented approach to showing fashion took seed when pandemic restrictions pushed Michele to “reframe the creative horizons of my work” and along the way, “pursue new languages and uncommon expressive platforms”. He arrived at film as his chosen medium. “I needed a vehicle to inject myself into life, to depict it from the inside.” The resulting film finds beauty in the mundane, tracking a day in the life of artist and performer Silvia Calderoni; like real life itself, it is composed of a stream of little events and sometimes even non-events. It starts with Calderoni at home, then follows her as she makes stops at a café, a post office, a theatre rehearsal and a vintage shop, and then taking a night walk. Along the way, she encounters an eclectic cast of characters that includes the House’s famous friends, such as Harry Styles, Jeremy O. Harris, Billie Eilish and Florence Welch. While nothing may quite replace the immersive power of a fashion show, the film format actually feels wonderfully synergistic with Michele’s Gucci. His work has always had a cinematic bent to it, in the sense that the models in his shows look more like individual characters with their own inner lives, backstories and narratives—with the clothes they wear an outward manifestation of those different stories and identities. This season, the clothes are also a reinforcement of the codes that Michele has set for the House from the get-go—the vintage references distorted through a contemporary lens, the irreverent clash of eras, and the exuberant mash-ups of unlikely prints and pairings. To further underscore just how unwavering he has been in his vision, Michele even reissued pieces from his very first Gucci collection for fall/winter 2015. The pussy-bow blouses, the flesh-coloured lace, the fur-lined loafers, that pleated red floral dress—all the building blocks so essential in laying down the foundation for a new romantic, maximalist era in fashion those years ago are present and accounted for here. In this one master stroke, Michele both proved the enduring power of thoughtful design and provided a beautiful riposte to the old fashion system’s demand of newness for newness’s sake.