Public88 : Fashion

Colours ranged from faded and sun-bleached to vibrant. Fabrics ran the gamut from nearly diaphanous silks to crumpled linen and distressed denim. Some labels emphasized handcrafted artisanal details, others eye-catching, over-the-top prints. But if there was one overarching theme at the Milan Fashion Week showings of men’s fashion for spring/summer 2012, which wrapped up last week, it was a certain boldness, nay, swagger that the well-dressed man has been missing over the last few seasons.

Among the notable presentations:

Dolce Gabbana

Dolce Gabbana’s spring and summer collection drew inspiration from nets – the kinds found on fishing trawlers and soccer fields and that other Net, with its sticky, narcissistic web of social media that amplifies while it also distorts.

The first manifested itself in the fabrication, with micro-perforated belts and leather jackets with holes as fine as a kitchen colander; with loose, loopy sweaters and shirts with holes big enough to poke three fingers through.

Some laser-cut leather pieces, particularly jackets and shoes, were as sharp as graph paper. Others seemed woven into a loose grid in a simple over-under fashion out of cord the diameter of clothesline. Still other pieces – accessories, including belts and bags – were characterized by a tighter, lattice-like weave.

Transparent, mesh-like netting was used as the outer layer of long-sleeve shirts and trousers, or lined with washed cotton poplin T-shirts and shorts, and different styles of netting were paired together on the same model – and occasionally in the same mixed-fabrication garment.

In the finest pieces, the fabric and net-like construction brought out the best in the design, allowing leather bomber jackets to hang as lightly on the body as diaphanous silk, for example.

In a few manifestations, the idea was taken too far – most memorably in a gray sweater with liquorice-stick-sized loose ends standing at attention on the shoulders and yoke, reminiscent of what Pinhead from “Hellraiser” might wear.

That’s a lot like that other Net the designers had on their minds. Stefano Gabbana has enthusiastically embraced Twitter and uses it as a way of getting instant feedback for his ideas, and those who had a seat at the show found a card explaining that a WiFi connection had been set up so that attendees could post short messages reacting to the show – in essence, tweet from their seats – with the messages scrolling the length of the runway on two huge screens above the crowd.

My attention was focused on the clothes, not the messages. But the instant response likely gave Dolce Gabbana a trawler full of feedback with the net they cast – insight they probably think is pure and unfiltered, not tainted or diluted by critics, bloggers or haters.

Giorgio Armani

The runways of Milan were packed with prints, from subtle, almost shadow-like (at Bottega Veneta and Etro) to beyond bold (a foulard fest at Dolce Gabbana’s secondary line, DG, and Versace’s swagger summit among them), but Giorgio Armani somehow managed to cover the range, with a menswear collection that focused on geometric prints that were just eye-catching enough to make the Armani man stand out but not enough to get him singled out.

That meant a collection of zigzags, checks and stripes ranging from blue microcheck button-front shirts to exploded houndstooth trousers. Black chevrons danced down white neckties, ombre sweaters faded from black and gray checkerboards at the chest to dusky blue at the waist, and several different trompe l’oeil woven patterns appeared on sweaters, shirts and jackets.

The boldest of the designs was a brightly contrasting black-and-white horizontal zigzag pattern that covered jackets, shirts and trousers – but fortunately not all on the same model at the same time. (Some patterns actually did play well together, such as one look that paired an exploded houndstooth check pair of pants with a zigzag shirt in the same white and dusty brown color combination.)

The colour palette was grounded in black, white and gray, accented by a grab bag of blues and a few variations of brown. The big story in terms of silhouette was darted trousers that were nipped in at the waist and were cut generously through mid-leg, creating a billowy effect that stopped at just the appropriate side of the drop-crotch trou popularized by MC Hammer. Jackets felt light and unconstructed – which is no small feat when a fair number of them contained the extra material that comes with a double-breasted jacket.

Espadrilles have been a popular shoe on this season’s runway, and Armani offered up his versions as well, pairing the casual woven rope sole with luxurious uppers including velvet, crocodile skin and suede. The standout pair juxtaposed a brogue upper with the espadrille sole.

It’s hardly a marriage that seems suitable, but as the high priest of menswear, Armani has the skill to not only get an “I do” out of such pairings, but to know they’ll live happily ever after.

Prada

For spring and summer 2012, Prada hit the golf course – what else could come to mind when you hear the phrase “geometric outdoors?” The designer said that was the goal of the indoor “field” where the show took place – the 600 foam blocks placed on a grid of artificial turf throughout the company’s headquarters and show space on Via Fogazzaro. A description of the space handed out to the media emphasized the spacing of each foam cube and the strictly choreographed routes each model would take to assure maximum visibility. She described it as having “the audience participate in a perfectly organized picnic.”

Anyone who wasn’t thinking about golf when the show began must have been by the time a handful of looks had gone by – what with the red, blue and yellow floral-print golf bags, Prada wingtip shoes with golf-cleat soles and an assortment of headgear and trousers that would have looked right at home on the links.

But designer Miuccia Prada is never that one-note, and inspiration as straightforward as golfing – even as the brand readies for a long-awaited IPO on the Hong Kong stock index and golf seems to be the preferred sport of corporate America’s high rollers – was only part of the equation. The “eccentric golfer” motif was actually a walking timeline of festive, life-to-the fullest fashion – bold floral from Palm Beach in the ’60s, vintage English tie prints from the ’70s and action-packed cartoon prints from the ’80s. What at first appeared to be one print was actually three depicting all kinds of leisure activity – surfing, playing music and generally making merry. Though they were apparently from the ’80s, the images had a late ’50s, early ’60s look that could have been borrowed from just about anywhere – including the lining of kids’ sleeping bags (usually covered wagons and cowboys) and cocktail shakers (martini glasses and pink elephants) and the wallpaper of dad’s shag-carpeted rumpus room down in the basement (Playboy bunnies, martini glasses and more cowboys). Wildly floral western-style snap-button shirts sported contrasting floral yokes and button plackets. On solid colour versions, the plackets and yokes were framed in rows of chunky jewel-like stones. The uppers of some dress shoes were accented with woven raffia and others had contrasting leather fringe.

A commentary on golf, a metaphor for life, a desire for control over uncontrollable events – like an IPO or a picnic, for instance? No one’s saying, but rest assured that when Prada packs a picnic, you’re guaranteed a feast every time.

Versace

Exhibit A for bravado was the colourful collection designer Donatella Versace sent down the catwalk. The silhouette for the season hearkened to the Versace of yesteryear, strong at the shoulders with widened lapels, nipped in slightly at the waist and wider again at the hip.

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