Prada strips dresses back, foulard inspires Versace in Milan

September 24, 2021

By Marie-Louise Gumuchian

(Reuters) -Prada deconstructed dresses at Milan Fashion Week on Friday, using elements including trains and corsets in a spring collection that explored seduction through clothes.

Co-creative directors Miuccia Prada and Raf Simons, who joined the Milan-based, Hong Kong-listed luxury group last year, added silk trains on miniskirts, put corset lacing on the front of jackets and mimicked brassiere cups on knitwear.

The spring/summer 2022 collection, called “Seduction, stripped down,” also featured long back-baring dresses in pink, lime and tangerine that were cinched at the waist.

Short dresses were also slit behind and had trains while biker jackets were given a worn look and paired with the brightly coloured miniskirts.

“We thought of words like elegant – but this feels so old-fashioned. Really, it’s about a language of seduction that always leads back to the body,” Prada said in a statement.

“Using these ideas, these references to historical pieces, this collection is an investigation of what they mean today, what seduction means.”

For accessories, there were belted arm bands and pointy slingback shoes in bright colours.

Like New York and London, Milan Fashion Week is hosting both in-person shows and digital presentations this season following virtual editions in February due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

“I strongly disagree with the idea of a return to ‘normal’ – we must draw lessons from this moment. We have learned that we, in fashion, engage with a much wider world,” Prada said.

Prada held simultaneous shows in Milan and Shanghai, livestreaming both.

“Doing these shows simultaneously demonstrates a new possibility: that a Prada show can happen anywhere,” Simons said. “It’s about sharing – not just sharing imagery, not just sharing through technology but sharing a physical event.”

Singer Dua Lipa opened and closed the Versace show, which built on the fashion’s house’s printed silk scarf, or foulard.

Designer Donatella Versace transformed the scarf into lining for dress slits and asymmetric hems, jacket sleeves, shirts, trouser flares and knotted headscarves.

The line featured latex dresses and shiny miniskirts in neon colours. Some designs bore large safety pins.

For men, there was casual wear, loose suits and relaxed printed shirts.

“The foulard is a fundamental component of Versace’s heritage and character,” Versace said in show notes. “…This season (it) turns everything on its head, it is no longer fluid or dreamy, the scarf is provocative, sexy, wound tight.”

(Reporting by Marie-Louise Gumuchian; Editing by Giles Elgood and Cynthia Osterman)

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