Next season Canali will show the first collection from newly appointed designer Hyun-Wook Lee. As Elisabetta Canali explained at this presentation, Lee has been recruited not as a creative director charged with some highfalutin artistic vision for the house, but as a firmly focused collections designer “because we are very concrete.”
The clothes scattered around her proved the South Korean alum of Berluti will have an impressive pool of industrial tailoring expertise to draw on. Highlights here included long overcoats made in materials that should pique the interest of plutocrats everywhere, including a fifty-fifty wool-chinchilla and wool-mink mix. Add to that the house’s “Super Light” jacket delivered in super gentle irregular checks and herringbones, a peacoat in finely waffled cashmere with an unorthodox asymmetrical cut, and wool coats whose finely flecked constellations of lilac, teal, green, and blue were almost monotone at first sight yet became hypnotically kaleidoscopic with proper attention.
Canali is remaining true to itself—and has suffered as a consequence—at a time when it might easily have joined the rush to incorporate elasticized waistbands and track tops into the vernacular of tailoring. The strength of its product and the imminent arrival of Lee, a seasoned designer with a fresh eye, hints at better times ahead for a company whose authenticity certainly merits them.
