Bling-friendly Dolce & Gabbana presents quiet luxury at Milan Fashion Week menswear shows
MILAN (AP) — Menswear is looking for post-pandemic hold during Milan Fashion Week, landing somewhere between resort, adventurer and tailoring.
Dolce & Gabbana offered quiet luxury as only the designer duo can, reinventing masculine silhouettes with feminine details. For its part, MSGM offered adventure with an off-road collection inspired by African travel.
On the sartorial side, Ralph Lauren showed off his high-end Purple line at his patrician villa in Milan, with an emphasis on made-in-Italy details for everyday luxury, including polished footwear, unconstructed cotton-linen blend jackets and chunky knits. Fair Isle clothing.
Margherita Maccapani Missoni chose the menswear shows to unveil her new brand, using her paternal Maccapani family name instead of mother Angela’s more familiar Missoni. Her female-focused Maccapani brand features easy-to-wear, figure-hugging garments that are meant to accompany women throughout the day—a twist on the knitwear that made the Missoni family brand a household name.
Some highlights from Saturday’s second-day shows of mostly menswear previews for Spring-Summer 2024.
DOLCE & GABBANA WOMEN MAKES MEN’S CLOTHING
Designers Domenico Dolce and Stefano Gabbana have feminized menswear silhouettes this season, using sartorial tricks long used for women.
The extensive collection of almost 80 looks was a starting point for the designer duo for every season, a game with quiet luxury. There were no prints, no color and no bling. Instead, the focus was on form and materials, with a neutral color palette of black, white and camel and ivory.
Taffeta had ruffles around the waist, creating a cummerbund effect but reminiscent of the duo’s provocative ruffled dresses. Fluffy tunics with deep V’s that reveal the chest and long, hanging sleeves. A sheer organza top and pants were nicely decorated with floral appliqués on the cuffs. Organza panels gave an ephemeral touch to pants. Wide satiny trousers were paired with a form-fitting mock turtleneck, a look that would also suit women.
A series of oversized bespoke coats summed up the tailoring, with hourglass waistlines on long coats, ruffles on oversized puffers, deconstructed sheer paneled coats, and cushiony cardigans.
Back-zip boots and shoes added a futuristic edge to the looks, especially worn with ribbed long johns or briefs.
Dolce & Gabbana filled the front row with celebrities including Machine Gun Kelly, Italian Blanco, South Korean Doyoung and Australian Luke Hemmings.
MSGM RIPE
MSGM, at age 13, is growing up.
The fashion house’s creative director and founder, Massimo Giorgetti, said backstage that the collection was inspired by a recent trip to Tanzania, specifically the hours just before sunrise, which he likened to the moment “when you realize a desire to grow up, but youth remains in the head.”
Models – including some older men, in a brand first – emerged through fog into a grooved cavern beneath Milan’s main railway line, as if emerging from a cave in the African dawn. They were accompanied by rhythmic electronic music.
Giorgetti’s own iPhone vacation photos became prints and motifs: sunset ombre on T-shirts and knitwear, frayed cotton reminiscent of zebra prints but in monochromatic tops or suits, striped eco-leather imitating geological formations on overcoats.
Silhouettes were grown, with almost no sweatshirt. For the growing MSGM crowd, there were oversized suits in jacquard earth tones, purple wisteria, or celeste blouses with large-pocket cargo pants. Protective canvas hats that snap around the neck to form a collar when not in use. Soft high hiking boots, moccasins and loafers completed the looks, with jewelery in polished stone or raw amethyst.
