Kim Jones placed the creative synergy between himself and Delfina Delletrez at the heart of his Fendi haute couture show. “I started with looking at Delfina’s Fendi high jewelry, which she’s done for the first time,” he said. His palette flowed “in almost an organic way, with colors and embroideries based around the hues of natural stones, rubies and sapphires,” he added. “It’s the idea of the silhouette being ‘nothing’, but everything at the same time.“
If there’s a space for understated, grown-up luxury eveningwear now—which seems a logical tone for the times—then Jones’s vision for Fendi haute couture is aimed at filling it. The aesthetic he’s established is based around draped, wrapped, shapes—1990s minimalist aesthetics merged with echoes of the statuary of ancient Rome, where Fendi is based. This season’s iteration became his canvas for the launch of Delletrez’s 30-piece collection of Fendi precious jewels.
The models walked around a marble floored quadrangle, a scenographic impression of Fendi’s headquarters in Rome. Most were clutching a version of a Fendi bag—small rectangular leather jewelry boxes. Earlier, Delletrez had been on hand, working on styling the concept with Jones, while her mother Silvia Venturini looked on.
Her distinctive diamond earrings, brooches, and necklaces shone from the runway. “Everything is very fluid,” she explained, showing how she created draped, asymmetrical shapes, studded with pink spinels and yellow diamonds, ingeniously incorporating tiny geometric plays on the Fendi logo. “It was nice to work on the jewelry first,” Jones remarked.
Even before the show, clients were lining up to view Delletrez’s jewelry in the same space as Jones’s couture fittings were going on. “You don’t normally have this, but at Fendi, we all work together.”
