Sometimes it happens that the planets align perfectly. This was the case on Monday evening, May 16, during the Gucci house cruise parade organized in the Puglia region, in southern Italy. “I hadn’t anticipated that it would be a full moon, and that there would be an eclipse the night before, but that’s also the magic of Gucci,” explained Alessandro Michele, artistic director of the house since 2015, during a press conference the morning of the event.

Called “Cosmogony”, this collection, presented around Castel del Monte, a magnificent 13th century castle with a hexagonal shape and as if set on top of a hill near the village of Andria, indeed draws its inspiration from the sky. and constellations. But with Alessandro Michele, the point is never literal.

“I have wondered a lot about what it means to be a fashion designer today, in 2022. It is no longer a question of imagining a dress for a specific woman or for a particular event. Today, to make a collection, it is a question of assembling a succession of images, colors, shapes, attitudes or faces. The creative process is difficult to explain, it remains something very mysterious. »

This set of associations of ideas composes, for him, what constitutes his own creative constellation. During the press conference, Michele explained that this approach is similar to the work of the early 20th century philosopher Walter Benjamin, who constructed his thought through collections of ideas, quotes and concepts. Constellation thinking.

Highly Instagrammable

Cerebral and creative, Alessandro Michele has been undeniably so since his arrival at the head of the style of the Florentine house. Its very visually strong universe, sometimes bordering on the limits of the fantastic, mixing historical references, mixing genres and femininities, all served by a grandiose – and highly Instagrammable – theatricality, makes Gucci today one of the most appreciated by the younger generation.

This collection is thus part of the continuity of this so recognizable universe. We thus saw on the long catwalk beautiful and long velvet dresses embroidered with sequins and with suggestive cutouts, short black dresses worn with large laced thigh-high boots and feathered opera gloves, but also 1940s silhouettes – large capes and elegant suits reminiscent of Greta Garbo – or even long evening dresses in muslin draped and embroidered with flashy sequins, accompanied by Harlequin collarettes. Accessories, the sinews of war for luxury houses, are available in handbags inspired by jewelry boxes, ballerina shoes in shiny varnish or even in accumulated charm jewelry.

As a finale, a map of the starry sky and the different moving constellations was projected onto the facade of the castle. “I chose this place for its magical side. I don’t see it as a fairy tale castle, but more of a rave party,” explains Alessandro Michele. The cast, whose diversity of ages and bodies can be highlighted, was undoubtedly dressed for the occasion.