Silvia Venturini Fendi's daughter is attending university in London, and when Venturini Fendi goes to see her, they often end up meeting in a nearby park. While she waits, Venturini Fendi watches faculty members taking some time out from their day. Enough of them are wearing corduroy that she can safely assume—cliché aside—that corduroy is indeed the cloth of choice for educators.
So Fendi's catwalk tonight was a dream for academics everywhere. Corduroy for days. Venturini Fendi was wondering if it was that park in London that triggered her appreciation. It was certainly some place similar that inspired Fendi's latest Bag Bug: an apple. It dangled fetchingly off suede or pony backpacks, which also had net pouches that held a ball. "You take a break in the park, eat an apple, play ball, reconnect with nature," Venturini Fendi explained. Hence the collection's earth tones and fabrics as organic as Harris Tweed.
There is something equally classic about corduroy, which made it a logical way station for Venturini Fendi's ongoing exploration of a man's wardrobe. Besides, it gave her all those lines to play with. Alongside the needle and whale variations of the fabric itself, the shearlings and leathers also had trompe l'oeil cord grooves.
That's a typical Fendi effect. Nothing is quite what it seems. This collection pushed the notion further by making every jacket and coat fully reversible. For a moment, Venturini Fendi even considered sending the collection down the catwalk one way, flipping it inside out, and sending the whole thing out again. "The collection looks completely different when it's reversed," she said. "It's like the peekaboo effect in clothes." Or like the brown suede coat that flipped to gray leather. You'd have to be a pretty rich teacher to walk away with such an item, but there was an ingenious utility in more accessible pieces, like the huge scarf with pockets big enough to hold an iPad.
