Paolo Gerani and his new design team have traded in Hitchcock blondes for muses a little closer to home—Lauren Hutton, Faye Dunaway, and Farrah Fawcett, all of whom starred in the ad campaigns Oliviero Toscani lensed for Iceberg in the late seventies. That meant there was a pretty big disconnect between last season and this one, but it landed the label smack-dab in the middle of things in Milan, which is never a bad place to be.
What was good: the fact that Gerani and company's take on fashion's favorite decade was more impressionistic than literal. Oversize men's blazers with pushed-up sleeves, a sea blue cotton jumpsuit with embroidered straps, silk button-downs tucked into A-line skirts—we've seen enough of this sort of thing lately for it to have shed its retro associations. But with so many labels all over the price spectrum doing the seventies, which elements provided a compelling reason for shoppers to seek out Iceberg next spring? Not the beaded and feathered macramé tanks and scarf tops. Simpler was better here, and there was nothing simpler or better in this collection than a faded denim elastic-waist dress.
