Fashion revolution is every day

Sustainable is a word I will never tire of hearing, saying and a lifestyle I will always be compelled to practice. Depending on the generation, you encounter people that are thrilled to use it, know about it, want to share their practices, discoveries and habits for a better world or simply tag people that prcatice it as tree huggers (as if it were a dishonor). 

There's people, so very much 2001, that don't want to know, duck their head under the sand like an ostrich, still arrogantly believing that "someone" will do it for them, whether in politics, enviroment, education, health, minorities and they don't have the responsibility to do anything. 

It's time to wake up and be active citizens, choose your cause and do anything that it's in your power and more, go the extra step, don't wrap your eyes with prosciutto. Our children are born in a world in which they will have to deal with the mistakes that us and the generation before us have made. We can't reverse global warming, landfills of plastic bottles, deadly polluted rivers, but it's in our power to stop the deterioration. 

HOW?

I am going to give you two suggestions. 

Fashion Revolution because fashion is about feeling good, fashion is knowing that what you wear hasn't been produced under slavery conditions, that nobody has to work 120 hours overtime a month for that damn t-shirt that you will wear 3 times and throw away because it's destroyed and it will, itself, pile up in a landfill that will never disappear from Earth. Fashion is about not wanting more, but desiring a piece so much that you end up cherishing, taking care of, mending, fixing and wearing it for as long as you can. Fashion is knowing who made the clothes that you wear, knowing where did it all begun, feeling empowered by knowing that you saved money to purchase that beautiful item you wanted.

All of the above is the way I grew up thinking that fashion was about, it's why I fell in love with fashion, it's the Italian way of dressing, owning your style with that conscience that you always are appropriate wherever you go, because luxury is first a state of mind. 

It's a Revolution that wants to bring back things to where they were before, the Italian way I must say.  Join the movement and help spread the voice, and if you want a crush course on how to attain it, get the book here.

NOTE: Sharing some pictures of the masterclass held at Miami Dade College's Fashion Institute during Miami Fashion Week where we were enlightened by Orsola de Castro, the founder of Fashion Revolution, Barbara Hulanicki, OBE founder of legendary Biba and fashion visionaire supreme and Willie Walters, director of fashion at London's Central Saint Martins

Plastic Free July and every month. 

Why? I am going to give you 7 reasons that the Italian in me would use to convince you:

1. who needs a straw, really? Unless you had dental surgery

2. who drinks coffee in the paper/plastic cup?

3. who eats food from foam containers? Honestly, they make an annoying noise and make the food taste weirdly synthetic. 

4. why would you eat from plastic plates with plastic cutlery? China and silverware is not meant to keep for Sundays. 

5. how gross and vulgar is that Solo red cup? (<--- you bet Cecilia knows better when she'll be in college)

6. who does groceries without recycled bags anymore? In Italy they charge you for every plastic bag the supermarket provides you, and it's been like this for as long as I remember. 

7. why would you drink water from a plastic bottle? Do you even know how many bacteria are stored in that bottle and that it is not recyclable? 

Accept the pledge & CHOOSE TO REFUSE

NOTE: did you notice how I was holding a plastic coffee cup at the event with Barbara Hulanicki? Since after I took the pledge, I have been so resilient to choose to refuse and wherever I go I ask for a glass or porcelain cup for my coffee. It doesn't hurt asking, you get the side eye, but they always have it. 

Paris and its (high) lights

Paris started as boring as it finished with the most glorious fashionable fireworks.

Everything was stiff until we got delightfully surprised by, wait for it:

Dries Van Noten and Alexander McQueen, Miu Miu and Stella McCartney.

Dries’ collection was like one of those gigantic Tashen coffee table books: such a good down the memory lane masterpiece that included the best casting of the season. Elegance and chic of the last 25 years condensed in his 100th runway show, those many good looks and models still relevant demonstrated, at least to me, that the desire of newness, the thirst for more, are only a made up social media reality show.

Alexander McQueen’s Sarah Burton once again spoke with nature. She is like the St. Francis of Assisi of fashion, from Scotland to Cornwall, she establishes a poetic conversation with nature at its most crude state. Last season she made a shipwreck into one of the most coveted evening gowns

Stella McCartney was happy tailoring, Faith-ful to her own roots.

Miu Miu closes the festivities covering a majestic staircase in purple faux fur making us want to update our foyer and some Prince moves even before the show started. After the show, if you don’t own a sort of headpiece you are a nobody in life. If you haven’t gotten the memo, the only trend you really need to be conscious of is: headpiece is the new black. You are welcome.

A few extra notes.

An element that all these collections have in common: none of the Insta-stars models were booked for the runway. This could be in between petty, I admit it, or a Gen X thing. They were not missed. 

Special mention goes to Chanel that never disappoints and this time catapulted everybody to the Moon and back.

If you haven’t gotten the memo, the only trend you really need to be conscious of is: headpiece is the new black. You are welcome.

It saddens me infinitely that I cannot mention anymore lanvin as one of the highlights of Paris and can't wait to see Alber Elbaz shine again. 

Milan Fashion Week, it only gets better

The best of Milan fashion week will take me a few posts. 

As a matter of facts: there's a part of this conversation that will land in the newsletter, and you are still on time to catch it for tomorrow. 

There’s a trend I am happy to report I am totally embracing: now more than ever the time is right for fashionto blend with reality, fashion is born from everyday life after all.

Many, many designers have adopted their creativity and skills and used the catwalk as a platform to raise awareness, many have made statements, the peak of them all, so far, being Mrs. Angela Missoni who with her mother, children, nephews has recreated a Women’s March “because the Fashion world stands united and fearless”.

This fashion month is happening while too many events are unfolding that pose a threat to human rights, freedoms granted by our constitution and democracy.

How to be part of it?

Business of Fashion has launched an initiative called #tiedtogether

Post a picture wearing a white bandanna, the symbol in support of solidarity, unity and inclusiveness while raising money for ACLU and UN Refugee Agency.

Anyone can participate, by donating, by posting, by helping spreading the news.

Using fashion as a form of art, in support of the constitutional freedom of speech, supporting diversity, expressing feelings of unity and the deep general discomfort versus the new dictatorial, fascist and cold-hearted establishments rising is something that I had only seen in my books of fashion history. Now I am living it in person with pride, as, finally, that myth and story that fashion is frivolous can go shuttered.

And now: have FUN because you guys, the collections have been bombastic. Tuesday was double trouble Alessandros, the Michele of Gucci and Dell’Acqua of N.21 have d e l i v e r e d as you would expect from a magician. In Italian we love to say: ci hanno fatto sognare.

Gucci was a post-apocalyptic show of 120 looks the Alchemist Garden, everything of everything because saying that fashion doens't repeat itself would be a lie. N.21 went from Neorealism to the American Dream (NOTE by yours truly: there's a lot of Anna Magnani in the collections, feminine, powerful yet sensual and young at heart).

In Miuccia we trust became a truth like few in life. The City of Women was what she sent down, an evolution from last month's man show. Don't we all dream a city designed by Miuccia? I mean, not the despicable Zara knockoffs, but a real, true Prada-clad worlds. Just one note: second collection in a row featuring feathers. Just. Saying. You are welcome.

Max Mara has made classics exquisite again (although this sounds a too creepily familiar tagline) and embraced the diversity theme with the first jihab wearing model, Emilio Pucci hypnotized the world one fringe at a time, la Ferretti got the evening cape plus embellished flats memo like the Bible. 

Bottega Veneta and Jil Sander never disappoint on Saturday morning and have delivered masterfully, sophistication and rigor.

Missoni recreated a Women’s March, full on pink pussy hats delivered to the guests and worn by every model and the complete legendary family. I cried, it brought me back to when I was a kid, seeing Angela and Rosita two fierce women leading the pack of all the children, I saw my mom and grandmother and all of us.

NOTE: will update next week with Armani, Marni. And I am one of the few/many Italians that don't care for Versace, Cavalli and the Dolce & Gabbana. I can discuss this with you. 

New York Fashion Week: the highlights

You know when you have a premonitory intuition that something will disappoint you, again? Well, that's how I started watching the shows of the NYFW that just ended.

And I must confess, I am happy to report I was totally wrong. I think it all started with Raf Simons, i mean, I am still raving and still will for years to come. He made me proud of loving him so much and I said it all extensively. 

After him, seems like all these designers, the real designers I mean, not the stylists turned runway momentary prodigious specimen or commercial brands (except one that you'll see why), have followed suit with a lot of awesomeness. 

The parameters I have used for this highlight are simple and clear.

There has to be a story, the show notes are what I go after first. A precious suggestion, the best at sharing show notes is Eva Chen on Instagram.  You are welcome. 

Sartorial elements like coats and blazers, anything interesting borrowed from the boys because that's where skills, talents, intuition, innovation and creativity go unspoken and most of the times unrewarded. That's where Fashion wins and blends with art.

When you follow the details, the story, you understand the inspiration, your eye becomes utterly discerning, the selection of designers that you look forward to seeing will become tinier, and at the same time you start catching on new talents.

This time was also a peculiar one, unique in its genre. We are all taken by the storm, proudly, the fashion world has spoken up. The current political situation is putting any form of free expression at risk, from the arts to the press. What is Fashion if not the primordial language made of unspoken words that form sentences also known as style? There were powerful speeches, statements and encouragement words embroidered in shirts and hats. Time is still not ripe for a true revolution, like ‘70s type of revolt, and also the surreal-ness of the new status quo started so close to T-time, but the reactions all throughout fashion week made me feel part of an avant-garde movement, it created consciousness, unity and an educated discourse.

To promote unity, solidarity and inclusiveness, The Business of Fashion launched an initiative called #tiedtogether represented by a white bandanna that appeared profusely on runways and down the streets.

Exemplary statement of embracing realness have been Marc Jacobs with his 6 minutes on the dot runway with no music, photographers, flashes and the distractions of social media, the J.Crew presentation with some of my style icons, Christiane Barberich, Sandra Bernhard and Taylor Thomas Hills, Lauren Hutton,  and Julianne Moore at Calvin Klein

I let you be the judge. 

this is the look that most represents the collection to me 

I single out Mica, my favorite model, who walked the Ralph Lauren show with a pair of boyfriend jeans and a silk kimono like silk gown. 

divine Mica 

Raf Simons raised the bar

A pivotal moment in history.

We are talking about the debut ready-to-wear collection by Raf Simons for Calvin Klein.

Simons’ sensibility, surgical attention to detail, thirst for art and unique skills of designer’s proportions brought to surface all the elements that make Calvin Klein the incarnation of American fashion: Art Deco, the American West, the city, workwear, the denim, the quilt, power dressing, the ‘80s.

Nothing was left unattended or unspoken for, the show opened to David Bowie singing “this is not America” and that was the moment of truth and tears: finally Raf Simons back in action, free of expressing his talent, the true Calvin Klein, the one we grew up with coming down the runway and, last but not least, fashion, the one with the big “F”, the big universal connector.

And we all were in love again.

We are living within the tremors of our democracy, our freedom of expression through the arts, the diversity that immigration has brought into our country are being mined and weakened daily and this Calvin Klein Collection was an “homage to America”

To say it with the words of Christene Barberich of Refinery 29

A lot of people say that fashion and politics have no inherent connection, but they do […] we need a show like this to shake us out of our daily Orwellian despair, to see some beauty and art, but also to see how precious the time we are living now really is.

The harmony of the diversity resulted in a masterpiece of a collection that pleased all the senses.

It even received the seal of approval from The Cut ’s critic-at-large Cathy Horyn

Simons at Calvin Klein makes sense for a couple of reasons: He started his career as a youth-culture designer in Antwerp [...] And he has always worked with fine tailoring, which fits the minimalist image of Calvin Klein. Yet the reality is that the brand has meandered through various types of pastiche for a couple of decades now. That leaves Simons with a blank slate to reinvent with the kind of freedom that would never be available at a couture house.

Thank you for the dream. It's been real. 

THE 'MASCULINE FEMININE' IN THE fall 17 MAN SHOWS

It's not cocotte, it's not gamine, it's not Annie Hall or Marlene Dietrich, it's all together. 

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This article on Another Magazine makes the case of Annie Hall self-styling on point. Her eyewear are considered an accessory to show her nerdiness. 

It's that blending of the tailoring elements notoriously belonging to a man's fashion and re-interpreting them with feminine attributes. 

In the book I have dedictaed a whole chapter to the art of "borrow from the boys". When to present the collections, see now buy now and incorporating girls and boys in the show has become a practice. 

I have collected the most inspiring looks. We don't all have the same opinions, but if you are reading we share similar taste and style. Juts remember the word "inspiring" because some of them bay be seemingly outrageous, but dissecting all the elements are there for us to grasp. Style is not copying, it's interpreting as your day unfolds. 

"It's Oscar Wilde, it's military, it's dandy, it's aristocratic, it's romantic" Alexandre McQueen's Sarah Burton pays a tribute to Oscar Wilde, in case you hadn't gotten the hint. 

Thom Browne was a show of sartorial uniform dissected, the glorification of Harrys Tweed in all 1,200 yard, as per WWD. 

Miuccia wants us all to be "more human, more simple, more real". Nerdy is good. 

The future is female ... 

"borrow from the boys": the italian way

At Pitti Immagine 91, in Florence, is all about the pants, big pants The New York Times says in an exhilarating (well, at least to me) article that describes how Pitti Immagine is all about fashion.

Styles, colors, fabrics, a delight and endless array of men and women dressed to the nines that become a pleasure to all the senses, the venues of the events nothing short of Renaissance buildings or green houses and gardens, the Sala Bianca in Palazzo Pitti and … the Sala Bianca in Palazzo Pitti 

Pitti is a thing, an event that any lover of fashion will have to experience in their life to consider themselves seriously inducted. When Pitti happens to you, it will never be the same, you can’t really get it any other way.

WARNING: there's a term for these boys, it's "Peacocking" 

I hoped with the book to explain a bit more, my university final thesis was on how Italian fashion was seen and portrayed in the UK in the 80s, point is, here, not to give a lecture on fashion history, but the story telling about what’s really the “fashion” that is a passion of mine and happens to be kind of in the genes of many Italians.

Chapter 6 of the book is called “Borrow from the boys” as part of the Italian way of dressing is to borrow elements from a man’s wardrobe. It’s actually more of a stealing, hence their imperfection, big pants, bigger watches, lace-up brogues or double monk moccasins, sometimes it's a perfume or a overcoat. And, please, who didn't steal a cashmere sweater to their [insert whomever male gender you were close to]. 

Women in menswear feel comfortable, look cool and sexy, things thrown together almost by mistake are worn with nonchalance and manifest empowerment. Pants are two sizes too big? Wear a thick belt at the last hole and wrap the hem all the way up and wear super duper stiletto.

Imperfection leads to effortless, there’s no premeditation, the eye catches a gorgeous tweed deconstructed jacket? There’s no cliché, in anything that you put together, add a feminine touch, and if it’s a pair of stiletto lace ups in suede with mink accents like my Baldinini borrowed for the occasion, why not?

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I barely go out with a mini-dress, but these shoes called for it.

How divine are they?

With frayed jeans, culottes, leather mini dress and animal print I could have definitely be in Florence, but even if I wasn’t, these heels are perfection: the patchwork of the different colored suede , the arch perfectly designed, an architectural heel that resembles the rooftop of the Empire State building and those mink pom poms are to die for.

They are fabulous also on a pile of books like this, kind of "Coveteured", after I took them out on the town. 

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A Loewe affair

In the hottest month of the year Loewe invited me to their flagship in the Design Distric to what came out to be one of the most sophisticated presentations I have ever attended in Miami .

And, I am known for being unapologetic and I say things as they are …

The fashion world is scattered with brands that leave their future in the hands of creative directors and designers and sometimes stylists. In my mind, into book-cave mode and focused on other things, I had dismissed Loewe as “another” one.

Wrong-issima on so many fronts.

The store.

It's been there for over a year now and I had never walked in. It features the remains of a relic smack in the middle that for some reasons sounds creepy, but it props you in an atmosphere of respect, silence and appreciation of the surroundings. Something as spiritual as Stonehenge: all those handbags in exotic skins and nappa, cut and assembled in Spain and displayed in the most irregular shapes look like visitors, wandering around like you exploring the surroundings. You are only bound to revere them.

The brand.

With a story of 170 years (the past), it’s been a staple of the life of countless families in Spain as a luxury brand known for craftsmanship and. Based on principles of progress, expertise, modern (the present) its heart still beats in Spain. A stance projected into appealing a crowd without borders that longs to be inspired.

The designer.

Three years ago it was passed to the hands (and brains) of Jonathan Anderson whose acumen has contributed to the re-interpretation of the brand’s DNA in a dynamic and modern fashion.

The clothing.

The collection is the first of its genre, inter-seasonal or what we call it, Pre-Fall is about refinement and fluidity, tactile sensations from leathers as soft as silk or as rigid as sellers, tailored and oversize, shearlings and volumes. The prints need a special mention, exquisite natural prints that seem coming from the Encyclopedia Britannica. I was especially fond of a mushroom and I think it’s because I am in fall mood already.

What do you wear for an event like this?

For the first time after 20 years I wore half of my wedding dress. I am divorced, but my wedding dress is a relic I proudly keep in my wardrobe. It was designed by a great friend, it wasn’t the first thing made-to-measure for me, but I am told that I was a pain, worse than a bridezilla in the process of deciding how I wanted to walk down the aisle. All I ever knew is that I wasn't imagining myself with a traditional dress. I guess it was worth the pain if after 20 years the skirt, in a pale pearl-grey silk-gazar was resumed, put on, zipped up with no hurt feelings (it could have gone haywire drama craze).

I paired it (down) with an American Apparel V-neck heather grey T-shirt, my ubiquitous FurryLAB feathered slides made with certified authentic vintage astrakhan and crocodile skins and a saffron cross-body purse by Raison d’Etre, the Sabine collection, in a distressed and antiqued leather.

The take-aways.

I discovered a brand.

I developed a crush on the collection. It’s like the first symptoms of being in love, when you keep thinking that you’d wear this with this and that with that without having them in your closet.

It’s in Miami.

The event was exquisitely organized, understated and elegant, nothing was overdone, there were no fake air-kisses.

Everybody was professional, welcoming and pleased to be hosting that I left with that feeling that I wanted to be friends with all of them.

I received a coin purse in gift, so tightly and perfectly packaged that I had double thoughts before opening it, they lasted 5 nano-seconds though.