On her trips to Cuba, Donatella Versace fell in love with the people. Hard done by, she acknowledges, but still with a sense of freedom that she relishes. Versace is a multimillion-dollar business, and it's not hard to imagine the responsibilities and restrictions that attach themselves to the figurehead of such a thing. So some of that Cuban freedom kicked into gear with the collection Donatella showed tonight. It was a steamroller of a show, driven along by Señor Coconut's Latin versions of Kraftwerk classics "Showroom Dummies" and "The Robots." A few of the models walked shirtless in ice-creamily colored crepe de chine suits, a vial of perfume dangling round their necks. One carried a picnic basket laden with Versace housewares. Another had a backpack filled with the same, including bone china cups ready for tea. (How's that for product placement?) There was plenty of barrio fishnet, but there was also broderie anglaise in jackets and jeans, slumdog aspiration in loafers limned with gold link, a cardigan cabled in gold, and white jeans embroidered with gold leaves. The skyline of Havana was mirrored in a blinding white guayabera and an intricately detailed lace shirt. Leather jackets were artfully appliquéd with athletic forms, classical in appearance, but equally likely to be the football-crazed street kids Donatella saw on one of her trips.
Cuba providing the spine of a Versace collection? It sounds like yet another self-indulgent high-low fashion incongruity. Still, it gave the show a coherent, celebratory, maybe even aspirational core. And the clothes at their best (those leather jackets, say) looked as vivid and fresh as anything Donatella has offered of late.
