Obsessions are often what fuels a great designer’s creativity. Alessandro Michele seems to acknowledge how an idée fixe can channel the sort of relentless energy and chutzpah needed to bring about change. “For men’s pre-fall I focused on formalwear, which is a bit of an obsession of mine,” he said via email. “I see it as a very fertile ground to explore and interpret, giving the possibility to create new versions. I’m interested in bringing in new elements and infusing the clothes with new meanings, or to also bring them back to their roots, but in a different way, giving them a ‘new’ life.” Indeed. When it comes to the fearless pursuit of “new meanings,” Michele’s credentials are impeccable.
This pre-collection was viewed after the fall men’s collection was presented in Milan in January, marking Gucci’s comeback on the Milanese catwalk after seasons of coed shows. It was interesting to read pre-fall as a sort of prequel to a fall show devoted to redefining the meaning of masculinity; Michele did it through the unfiltered lens of childhood, a time when stereotypes of manhood aren’t yet formed and thus the freedom to forge one’s identity is supposedly still in the cards. Presenting a dedicated pre-fall menswear collection seemed to reassert masculinity as an area central to further conceptual exploration; from a stylistic standpoint, formalwear was assumed as the almost universal template of men’s style, both expressive and protective of identity.
Putting tailoring at the collection’s heart and going somehow back to Gucci’s roots as a purveyor of a certain classic Italian elegance, Michele was apparently interested in breaking free from today’s ubiquitous genderless rhetoric—which at first glance seemed quite anticlimactic. After all, it was he who helped establish the fluidity of masculine/feminine high-style codes. His enormous influence still reverberates through fashion, both high and low. But being trapped in stale rhetoric isn’t Michele’s wont—quite the contrary. He’s at his best when he can push the discourse forward.
So do not expect a menswear collection that retraces a path already traveled. Masculinity à la Gucci now means owning certain codes with imaginative freedom. As he said during a postshow press conference last month, “What I’d like to tell is the complexity of masculine identity. We have to learn a different way to be males.” For pre-fall this manifesto translated into revisiting tailoring tropes in utterly romantic, extravagant ways, without detracting from its foundations as a bastion of masculine self-expression. It was definitely a virtuoso exercise on stretching classicism to its limits.
A parade of well-cut suits, mostly three-piece, was at the collection’s center. Slim-fitted and cool, they winked at the ’70s flair the designer favors, exuding a debonair quirk. That they could also look good on a woman is a subtext encrypted in every Michele collection; the point of difference was just the way they were styled. A printed silk robe de chambre was worn over a grisaille blazer with matching waistcoat and paired with stiff flared denim. A boxy Hawaiian-print shirt and surfer shorts ensemble peeked from under an impeccable beige raincoat, and an elegant trapeze-cut city coat was printed in delicate animalier motifs, which also graced a safari suit. Considered in retrospect, the pajama dressing looked like a hint of the childlike aesthetic we would see in the fall show.
Michele’s narrative is circular; even when it seems to shift gears, it reads as a continuum. The women’s pre-fall collection was shot in Rome by photographer Bruce Gilden. He was appointed the same task for men’s, further highlighting the abstract urban nature of a city known for its hypercharged historical past, only here it was stripped of any relics or antiquarian references. Italian rapper Achille Lauro (@achilleidol) acted as the collection’s appointed model, his ambiguous punk-inflected aesthetic resonating with Michele’s message of masculine reinvention. Not unlike Michele, Lauro enjoys provocation, while keeping his ambiguous look nothing short of soigné. In a few days, he will be onstage as one of the stars at the Festival di Sanremo with a tune called “Me Ne Frego” (“I Don’t Give a Damn”). In a recent interview he apparently said, “I do what I please: I’m used to being looked at as if I were an alien.”
