Fashion month: don't go anywhere before you read this

Minimalism is not an option, the runways have shown boldness, it loud and clear. The consumer is

increasingly global, mobile and trans-seasonal  - BoF

Taking over from New York Fashion Week that seems so long ago, I’ll follow with London, which has always been rich of innovation, eccentricity, individuality, creativity and wit. This spring summer my favorite were Emilia Wickstead and Paul Smith, crowned by the royal highness of Burberry. 

Well this year not as much as Milan’s fresh breath of air, new energy, enthusiasm and renewed sense of birth.

Gucci Gucci Gucci

Michele’s particular skill is to make the past look like something the future might crave – Tim Blanks

Then there was Jil Sander’s sublime architectural lines and more cloche, or bucket hats.

Oh no, wait, Prada: one word in Miuccia we trust, one of the best collection in seasons. I am afraid I can’t say the same for Miu Miu. I have always been a Miu Miu girl this one seemed a tad too forced.

Giorgio Armani concluded the week with a ceremony in celebrating the first 40 years of the maison.

How about Marras, Andrea Incontri, N.21, Marni and Erika Cavallini?

Paris is always the glitzy-est of all, the City of Lights that never disappoints.

Chanel included bien sur. 

Stella McCartney, Christian Dior, Dries van Noten , Rick Owens, Alexander McQueen, Valentino, Rochas, Vivienne Westwood, Lanvin

And, yes, I am a die-hard fan of Yamamoto

And to conclude, i recommend keeping in mind and liking eventually: 

yellow or at least adapting hair color and make-up to the new season’s color, bucket hats, vertical lines and geometric games. Just saying. You are welcome.

NYFW in one minute

New York fashion Week is the first of a 28-day marathon I like calling the fashion caravan. From there we go to London, Milan and grand finale in Paris.

Aaaaaaall the bloggers, IT girls, influencers arrive and eeeeeeeeverything is faaaaabulous.

Last season I was invited to attend the Carolina Herrera fall show, February 2015, my first NYC fashion week in ass-freezing temperatures. Also, first fashion week in the social media era for me, all my past ones in Milan, Paris and Florence not even cell phones were around.  Yes as jurassic as I am. It was kind of funky: a surreal behind-the-scenes of the white fenced surrogate reality you see on social media feeds.

Before I bore myself already, read HERE all my confabulations about it and continue.  

All you need to know from the Spring Summer 2016 from the city that never sleeps. 

A few worthy notes

Givenchy: bold move to come and show in NYC on 9/11. Leave it to Riccardo Tisci to make quite the show, an italian at the helm of a French maison in New York. And I am not talking about the KKlan that came in flocks like the invasion of the grasshoppers, I am referring to the homage to love directed artistically by Marina Abramovic. A strong and powerful collection, chapeau.

Oscar de la Renta: it's almost a year we have lost the divine man that will always hold a small tiny little piece in my heart and never know it. This was the third collection designed by Peter Coppng and the first one that screams Oscar. 

Josep Font of Delpozo is a fine couturier.

Proenza Schouler did up their game last season with a twist and this season they did it again. 

DISCLAIMER: some of the comments may be off-putting, but it's me being me, the following are the collections worth remembering. 

Oscar de la Renta

Delpozo: for my dream life, when I will be dressed by a couturier 

Proenza Schouler: I chose a backstage image because I needed the details of yet another incredible collection.

Ralph Lauren: this look doesn't even need a caption, such a classic

Marc Jacobs: because I have always dreamed of a black swan up my sleeve. No seriously the collection is the bomb.

Givenchy jaw dropping

As for the trends, onto another post. 

which ones were your favorites? 

the Miami Swim Show: 5 things the media hasn't told you

Before everyone goes on vacation, how about a review of what we’ll wear to the beach in December? Just to have us salivating for the covetable and longing for that bikini-bod we don’t have yet. 

The SwimShow does to Miami Beach what Pitti does to Florence, NYFW does to NY City. Or maybe not. I like thinking of a Swim Week street style.  It was all reduced to half-naked models running from show to show trying to catch-up breaths with #soMiami lateness. 

After 30 years, we call it the Swim Show, it was once organized by IGM and sponsored by Mercedes Benz, but ditched last minute earlier this year.  All strings pulled in a Miami way, the show went on.

We assisted to a showcase of what Miami can give best: legs for days, disproportionate unbalance of exposed flesh vs. fabric, palms, pools and booze.

We recovered the overload of beauty with a juice cleanse for life. 

Let’s go down to business and find out trends and the best according to me - de gustibus non est disputandum. As it happened with Pitti, I went for talent, innovation, inspiration and quality and left the big names to the big media outlets. 

Julian Chang chose the Ritz Carlton. He opened the ceremonies, swept away red carpet and landed the who’s who of socialites on first row. Vertiginous slits, those that you can't say where they begin or end,  rivers of sequins and glam. and a swim capsule collection  worth wearing in a Ted Lapidus pool, sipping champagne.  Imagine a Slim Aaron photo session  for vibrancy of colors and plastic forms.

Dijana swimwear showed at the Bass Museum, a venue that grants a certain status. A museum is not for anyone, but the Bass allows for everyone who attends a first row seat along the ascending ramp. Djiana transported us to a world rarely associated with fashion, a soothing spiritual realm. She expressed her inspiration with recurring symbols like bamboo, triangle, lotus flower and values of symmetry, sensuality, purity. Even with imperceptible bikinis, there was never a vulgar hint, but it felt organic and feminine. Atmosphere was so enchanted, the opposite to stiff that it was a real breath of fresh air.

Magda Gomes swimwear killed me and sent me to heaven, a collection for a languid and disarming beauty, like a siren. Imperceptible lycra, like hugging soothing silk, unexpected silver shells, rivers of chiffon were winners.  The unique print designed by Gomes played  with ethereal red coral twigs, ondulating flowers on a pearl grey background. It alluded to an enchanted garden that could resemble the realm of a nimph that met its own Neptune. The best accounterment of the range were several pieces of jewlery that include a cuff, a ring and a tiara for the future princess of the Oceans. Just in case you wanted to go on vacation and come back married.

F**K goes by a name irreverent and unapologetic, but it’s also Italian so how could I miss the show? I had the pleasure of chatting backstage with Mr. Giorgio, the creative mind of the brand. In a fun and hand-orchestrated Italian conversation, he explained how he decided to take the leap, venture off the other side of the ocean strong of two decades of growing presence in Europe. “The brand grew by itself, without investment in advertizing, because at the end, the final customer is the one that makes you grow."  

"We dedicate time to research in fabrics and trends, but our customers ultimately make us win the prize.” You guys, honestly, Italians are not easy to please, we don't get blinded by glossy papers or billboards, we set high standards before we give thumbs up to a brand. The collection was man and women, resortwear and accessories and nothing was left unconsidered. Audience was at full capacity around the pool that is a lagoon at the Setai hotel. If you heard of a ‘man at sea’ you heard correct: a photographer took the plunge in the pool to survive the asphyxiating heat and to take the closest shots. 

Sunday at brunch we were all called to social shopping which felt just about right. Sunday Soiree was the brilliant idea of PR masterminds The Rally Agency, retail therapy for a good cause with a splash of Bellinis. Organized to support  Style Saves, the non-profit organization that provides clothing to under-privileged students through fashion-related events, shopping a purpose. Needless to say I contributed to the cause with a mix and match bikini from Mare Cheia, funky rhodium and Swaroski crystals earrings from Cavana Jewels and a Panama hat from Regine Chevallier

It felt like a million dollar. 

TRENDS

Small, skin, mini, crop tops, deep slits, chiffon, sheer fresh fabrics and jewlery, thin chains, multiple earrings and knuckle-lets, head wraps and wide brimmed hats. 

Watch this space for special Q&As with some of these most amazing designers and talents. 

from Steven Meisel to Kate Betts: a hot june in miami

A June with a bang in Miami, a promising season.

Go figure, normally summer is the low season here and yes it took me years to get acquainted with the idea that, while I grew up where summer is the epitome of the high season, I live in the same hemisphere yet this is the time of the year when either you leave and go to … Europe or you stay put until better times come.

ROLE PLAY

The first Monday of the month was sealed with a cocktail at the Moore Building in the Design District celebrating the opening of ‘Role Play’ the Steven Meisel traveling exhibition sponsored by Loewe and Phillips Auctions. Nice groove, pleasant conversations and engaging networking.

Is it Miami up to something that I am missing?Tthis looks like Milan before everyone leaves for the beach: keep up the great job.   

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MY LITTLE PARIS

It continued in Bal Harbour. 

From Vogue to EIC at Harper's Bazaar, Kate Betts, the fashion journalist born under the wings of Mr. John B. Fairchild turned author, drew Miami's crème de la crème of style to Bal Harbour for a lavish luncheon at Makoto hosted by Lara Shriftman and Sarah Harrelson. A reading of her recently launched book ‘My Little Paris’ followed suit at Books & Books which is becoming the new fashion salon literaire in Miami. 

Bal Harbour stepped up its game from when I was working there, starting with the activities around The Fashion Project curated by Cathy Leff. 

#GucciCruiseNYC

This didn't happen in Miami, it was Chelsea, NYC but it marked the calendars as the re-birth of the Gucci legacy.

Cruise was the first collection that Alessandro Michele, th new man at the helm of the Florentine heritage brand, was able to design with enough margin of time. He blocked off a whole City block to have the models strut across a street in Chelsea and walk the catwalk: the cement floor of an art gallery covered in Persian carpets.

Michele’s new Gucci has been called weirdo, nerdy, deliberately grannified, a rag-bag parade of vintage, a fantastical story and a mismatched patchwork of everything. 

In reality the core of the Gucci brand had been long hidden under the carpets like dust, relegated to the closets, stuffed in the attics as a reliquiam of a time gone that we were supposed to forget. 

Michele's sensibility brought it back by digging in those same armoires, those same that one's grandmother has with a romantic and urban feel. 

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credit @angelicahicks on Instagram 

The connection? Fashion, with the capital F

I am kinda breaking the rules by putting together the two fashion conglomerates of Bal Harbor and Miami Design District, that are in an unspoken battle of opposite pulling forces, but I agree with anything they are doing, because they unveiling a new existence of Fashion in Miami. 

Investing in closet essentials: the art of more with less

“Kill your darlings, kill your darlings, even if it breaks your egocentric little […] heart, kill your darlings”

— Steven King

Does it ever happen to you that when you have something in mind, bits and pieces of your daily life come to whisper your theory is real?

In a more trivial perspective, this is really what went down: the weekend when I switch the wardrobe is fast approaching and I look at my winter clothing in a survival of the fittest mode.

How am I going to fit everything in storage? I can see piles of keep, give away, donate and toss, like in Sex & the City And yes, I always include a closet party with rosé and canapés because it makes the whole ordeal much more pleasant. 

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In a matter of a few days I first listened to an interview, dissertation on Essentialism. The Disciplined Pursue of Less by Greg McKeown and second was privileged enough to attend the award ceremony of the Pritzker Architecture Prize and the unveiling of the tent structure the posthumous honoree, late German architect Frei Otto, designed in 1953.

“You can do a few things superbly well, or a lot of things averagely well”

— Greg McKeown

McKeown's book begins from the idea that we are ensconced in the ‘you can have it all’ mentality in which we must say ‘yes’ unconditionally.

We live in the busyness bubble, an imaginary race to sleep less, be busier than  your neighbor under the false illusion of getting this invisible badge of honor.

Our days unfold through the tangled madness of long to-do lists that only lead us to be counterproductive, frustrated and anxious for not having completed tasks.

A life in which we look for more in a panting and puffing state, without really knowing what and, worst, why.

Greg thinks it’s best to live in a JOMO (Joy) state of mind and avoid the FOMO (Fear) like a pestilence.

Hyper-connected reality leads us not to think but to act in a routine that almost resembles flocks of migrant birds that, on a predetermined day of the year, all move somewhere else.

The solution to this? Less but better, to say it with Dieter Rams, that is: focus your choices towards innovation, part exploration of what works for you and part elimination of what doesn’t work for you. 

Frei Otto was an architect whose visions, talent, humbleness contributed to humanity with the simple concept of more with less.  ‘A good design never gets old’, confirmed Shigeru Ban during the panel introduction in a heartfelt tribute to his friend and colleague who was being awarded the prize after life took him away.

The tent is perfect, it holds up without a center pole, it protects you from the rain and keeps ventilation moving in and out, it’s white and blends within the environment, but more so, it’s so current yet planned and created 62 years ago.  

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Look, I am not going all Socrates on you, I am shooting a dart to my point, which is not really mine, as McKeown uses a closet as a metaphor to explain all these honing and pruning of your life, but I am really going to use the closet as the main focus.

What Otto contributed to my cogitations? The element of timeless.

Try to read all of the above in your own closet and it translates as follows.

• You can’t have it all in your closet, can you?

If you let your budget rule your closet you end up: frustrated (honestly, who can afford runway prices?), frantically buying fast fashion (knock-offs and the ethical dooming proposition of  wearing the product of a child’s labor), losing sight of what your style is while being drifted away by the El Nino effect of trends bombarding you and blurring your judgement.

• Busyness bubble is the equivalent of having too much that we don’t have anything to wear for the right occasion.

Sounds familiar?

• FOMO is the pressure of the hyper-connection, the pressure to perform no matter what, to spend your paycheck in that pair of shoes you saw that blogger wearing at the event. Or falling for the latest IT bag which will be surpassed by another at the dawn of the new season. 
• Hyperconnectivity: we have a daily impulse that calls us to buy and own without knowing why, without a rational criteria other than being prompted by the endowment effect command which makes us love more things that we own. 
• Timeless is the opposite of trendy and I will never get tired of mentioning it. Trends are what keep fashion moving and your closet alive, but when trends trickle down, it's time to move on to the next. It all makes sense when you are at peace with your own style where your way of dressing speaks your personality away. So, by criterias of pruning, honing, de-cluttering, cleaning, eliminating you master the art of more with less. 

With me it's a work in progress, how about you? Take over the comment area! 

7 reasons why you should forget everything you know about New York fashion week

Should George Orwell have assisted the Fall Winter 2015 New York Fashion Week, he would have opened the book like this:

'It was a bright cold day in [February], and the clocks were striking [ten] [when the temperatures dropped to one]'.

When your first time at New York Fashion Week is because you got invited to attend a Carolina Herrera runway show at Lincoln Center, it's Valentine's Day, it will be the coldest NYC winter weekend in twenty years and "50 Shade of Grey" opens in theaters: it's like an apocalyptic version of '1984'. 

There's life before and after a #NYFW

My first fashion job was at Pitti Donna (I know right? other generation, decades ago), then I graduated to Milan Fashion Week, traveled to Paris a couple of times for Paris Fashion Week. New York only matrialized in my itineraries in 2015. 

I would be dishonest to dismiss the excitement, despite the almost half a century of anagraphic years on my shoulders, I felt like Eloise at the Plaza. Actually I was. 

The collection really walks down the runway

The real Karlie Kloss opened and closed the show and it's a statement: nothing more magical, she owns the crowd, the catwalk with the power of her smile (body, legs, stature,posture,walk). You must come to terms that it's no livestream, you are standing there, you end up breathing in every second through your pores. It's the smell of fresh plastic lined up on the pristine catwalk, a vague mix of blowdried hair and make-up. 

Carolina Herrera is the undiscussed Queen of New York Fashion Week and all you can expect was delivered.

Professionalisms from the way A-listers are seated to the grace and elegance of her appearance on the catwalk wearing her signature impeccably pressed white blouse.

What happened in between was flawless fashion by the book, where traditional sophistication meets digital prints while following and mimicking the waves that the water makes. Curvaceous lines were the fil rouge that tied the looks as they were appearing on the catwalk. 

The massive use of flats all throughout the presentation was a regreshing and modern statement, a very #theItalianway one: you don't need heels to feel elegant or make a look so. 

You expect creativity, not a potlock of the best of in a huge meatloaf. 

Inspiration, attention to detail, luxury are all ingredients that weren't spared. 

Bravo!

It feels like winter

• The prohibitive (inhumane)  temperatures shock your flesh, at least those segments of flesh exposed when the doors open to the street, and it's exhilarating, refreshing (baad pun) and invigorating. You are ready to make it. 
• The Nivea handcream in the compact round blue and white tin is your life saviour.
• How about when 'smoke' comes out of your nose and mouth even if you don't speak? It reminded me of when we were kids and pretent to mimick our parents smoking, it puts a smile on my face: I was in a pretent world like when I was a child. 
• I dreamed for this to happen, I went through years of FOMO, actually only the Missing Out part of the acronym. I wanted to attent a a gashion week fall edition because I wanted to proof to everyone and reassure myself that I am not a #thatssoMiami pal clueless of what winter is. 

The real numbers

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• 11 years without seeing snow falling. DONE
• 5 pairs of shoes brought for three days, a record of editing
• 3 layers of legwear worn contemporarily, never happened to me before (at the time of press, before living in Miami, I lived in Milan, Florence, London, Manchester, Grenoble, visited Venice, Paris, Brighton, New York several times in the winter, so I am not really an islander)
• 4 hot chocolates unregretfully drank in one afternoon
• Can we have brunch at 10 and lunch at 1? because we did, regardless the strict fasting rules of fashion week
• the times I thought I had the perfect outfit and I didn't? countless
• The times I was able to fix the wrong look? this calls for arctic polar expedition on heels survival manual and equals the above

What should a fashion week NOT be about but goes viral

This is my Edna Mode corner of stating the facts. 

All opinions are mine and I encourage you to dispute, discuss, rant and disagree with me: GO!

• constructed, manipulated, sponsored street style: must say New York and Milan are infested by it and you must stay away from them like the weed or you end up getting caught in the net of the "bananas", "amazing", "fabulous", ohh and ahh 
• scams: this video and this video show the unfair amount of insolence, ignorance, pretense and clueless presumption we are surrounded by. How many do you know who may very well be in awe of Betsy Ross stars and stripes theme? 
• stylists/rappers/reality TV starlettes improvised designers. Ever stopped for a second to wonder what do  Alexander McQueen, John Galliano and Oscar de la Renta have in common? Studying, appreticeship, practice, talent, genius, patience, inspiration, dedication, passion, elegance, style, determination. A real, full, complete, hefty, mesmerizing collection comes down the runway fathered by hard work, technical knowledge, expertise, research, history, legacy. Then stylists help put it together for someone else to wear. In other words, a spaceship cannot be lauched by someone who went to Cape Canaveral on a field trip.  
• was it a New York Fashion Weak to say it with my fellow Italian compat Angelo Flaccavento at Business of Fashion? For as much as I am grateful and forever humbled by having had the chance to be at New York Fashion Week, there are very few moments worth chills or standing ovations. Fashion is not sameness, copy-cat, mocking, aspirational, fast, approximate, DYI. Fashion is not what people see from the outside: a bunch of crazy outfits, people being photographed in the streets and outside Lincoln Center 

I am one of the lucky ones to have had the honor to attend one a few of the real exceptions: i am proud of it as a passionate of all-things fashion and a fashion writer. 

Thank you for letting me tell you my version of it. 

My New Year's Wish is better than yours

Kid you not, it is really wonderful it is and at the end you will make it yours too. It's no shoes, fur coat or bag this time, but that doesn't mean you can't be fabulous. 

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Are you of the "You don't say your wishes loud, or they won't come true" family? I am and it won't matter, because my n.1 wish is available in endless quantity fo everyone. 

As a matter of facts, we have it in our hands everyday and we tend to dismiss it as a good that you can ignore. 

Do you laugh at least once a day? (Yeah, not one apple, one laugh).

Do you set the table and sit down for dinner with your family?

Ever thought of switching the phone off at lunch break and read a chapter or two of that book you have been wanting to finish?

When's the last time you went for a stroll in the park? Or to the beach (never remember this and i live at the beach!)

Have you ever stopped to count the rice? [READ the STORY]

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“We must stop living a life where we have no time”

— Marina Abramovic

How many of the questions above you answered with: "I wish I'd have the time?". Ok, the rice sounds dreadful, unless you do the experiment like Cec did. 

Too many times I have said that, to realize that they were all stories I had made up. Time is there, it faithfully runs like a river, always at a constant speed. Actually, if you remember from science or Spiderman, light is faster than anything else. So why we let our franctic lives run faster than the light and eat up, like PacMan the time we have?

We take time as a given, it's there like our family home where we always go back to. When the house has to go, all the memories that make you who you are today will always reside with you and accompany you to the next adventure. When time is gone, it is gone. Can you rewind and twirl with your daughter cause you missed it while you were checking Instagram? Can you see again your son's first goal because you had to check the stocks online? 

"We live in a world driven by technology, the best and the worst news. We must stop living a life where we have no time" says Marina Abramovic of what motivated her to opening the MAI, the institute where experiments as simple as sleeping and counting the rice are conducted. Such an eye opener: guilty as charged. And no, I can't stand being a Kardashian-ed victim of technology in which if you don't post you don't exist. 

So yes, I have asked Santa for 

time

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We live heisty lives and we are missing it all. 

Let's regain grasp on our lives instead of missing it all while we look further.

To a year filled with time. 

Cheers, 

Francesca xxx