If there's one item of desire to take away from the Fall collections in Milan, it might turn out to be something as low-key as a loose, slouchy, very luxurious mushroom suede coat. When all the noise and the pointy shoulders and the flogged-to-tedium eighties referencing is forgotten, pieces like the one Alessandro Dell'Aqua slipped onto the runway at the beginning of his show might prove to be the cool survivor.
While watching a Dell'Acqua show, a useful observation like that often pops up, even if there is no overarching moment to scribble down. He's good at nailing the single item, even if in truth most of his show is dutifully in step with the general Milanese way of doing things. Inevitably, then, Dell'Acqua was off to the disco with everyone else in town this season, except he'd had a vision of Joan of Arc on his way there—as if she were photographed by Bill King in the seventies. If that almost puts him in the laugh-out-loud category of fashion inspiration, the chain-mail knitwear tunics, fur, and feather and sequins he put together were no less pointless than some of his peers' notions for nightlife. And apart from his covetable coats, Dell'Acqua also did an original needle-heeled shoe: an assembly of crocodile, suede straps, and chain mail that would also be worthy of seeing the light of day next fall.
