Domenico Dolce and Stefano Gabbana aren’t immune to the Y2K fever sweeping through fashion this season, and why should they be? The year 2000 was peak Dolce & Gabbana, a moment when the glorious excesses of their aesthetic were swinging the fashion pendulum from the minimalist ’90s to the go-go early ’00s. Dolce and Gabbana have picked up on the renewed interest in the era. Their young assistants are enthusiastic about that part of their archive, and on-the-rise Gen Z pop stars are requesting vintage pieces, too.
Backstage Gabbana said, “We thought we’d do something not similar, but in the same mood as that 2000 collection. We’re coming out of a dark time”—meaning the pandemic—“and we want to enjoy life. We want light.” Their Metropol venue glinted like a diamond, with a mirrored runway, a faceted backdrop, and no fewer than 75 spotlights, but the set had nothing on the clothes and accessories themselves, which were tricked out in crystals by the kilo, even more than the men’s collection they presented in June.
Clicking through their 21-year-old collection is to clock parallels between then and now: the pelmet mini and sheer shirt combos, the beaded fringe skirts, the exposed lingerie, and logo underwear. Jennifer Lopez starred on a couple of T-shirts here in what looked like D and G’s tribute to another brand with staying power. But there were some other forward-thinking updates. Upcycling is also a trend they’ve picked up on, and they bought a stash of used militaria to deconstruct and remake to their liking. A camo jacket was lined in leopard and cargos were sliced off at the knee, with the cast-off scraps patch-worked into towering boots.
One way the industry hasn’t changed enough since the turn of the millennium is in its one-dimensional insistence on uniformly thin models. Dolce and Gabbana clearly have their eyes on the generation that’s coming up. In fact, Gabbana reported enthusiastically that the average age of their shopper post-pandemic is going down. To really engage with that demographic, they could think about a wider range of body types. Sexy comes in all sizes.
