Domenico Dolce and Stefano Gabbana have found their true calling in fashion: making people feel good about themselves. Smiles were worn runway-side—that’s unusual enough—at their celebratory show about the okay-ness of identity. “Each one of us is the king or queen of our own lives!” Dolce declared. Meaning, each of us is the sole owner of a unique cluster of genes—and why not celebrate that? The theme of this season’s show was DNA—the designers’ own fingerprints were projected on screens behind the audience. There were more than 150 looks (perhaps this is turning into an Italian inter-brand contest, after Riccardo Tisci’s Burberry score of 134 and Emporio Armani showing more than 170).
Still, size of show is less important than its emotional impact. In this case, it was an individual thing, huge fun for all, as you saw the person you were thrilled to see again or for the first time, each one decked out in one of the house codes. Monica Bellucci in a black-and-white polka dot dress. Carla Bruni in a baroque gold and silver three-piece trouser suit. Isabella Rossellini in black lace tailoring, with her daughter, Elettra, and her grandchild. Let’s not overlook Helena Christensen, Eva Herzigova, Marpessa Hennink, and—cue hoorays all round—Ashley Graham in leopard print. In a new turn of events—street casting broadening the perspective—queer identities were also whooped up, with women walking hand in hand and gender nonbinary people represented, taking the runway alongside grandmothers, daughters, sisters, and children.
Ultimately? There were some extraordinary clothes, especially the densely elaborate, embroidered tailored jackets that Dolce & Gabbana does so well. The designers also showed their equally impressive ability to frame traditional notions of femininity in all-out printed flouncy frocks and, quite the opposite, a canon of curvaceous black dressing.
Though the show was still staged in traditional runway style at the designers’ own Metropol theater building, there was a sense of social change going on here. Ultimately, it felt like a hybrid of the Italian passeggiata, where people of all generations stroll, dressed to the hilt, displaying themselves to neighbors on summer evenings and—at the beginning—a Catholic church procession. In other words: just like Domenico Dolce and Stefano Gabbana themselves—unique.
