Gucci and Tom Ford: The Ease of Repetition, the Challenge of Change

MILAN — The manifesto that Sabato de Sarno provided together with his new assortment for Gucci set him a lure within the sense that it created expectations that his personal inclinations made it unlikely for him to fulfill. Coats are clearly his ardour. It’s in all probability not a large leap to think about that the proper coat is likely to be his holy grail as a lot as the proper sleeve was Cristobal Balenciaga’s. De Sarno urged as a lot when he referred to the making of a coat as “a meticulous journey,” with the brand new assortment being “an obsessive repetition of that journey.”

The phrase “repetition” instantly leapt out. De Sarno has already proved himself a fan of the thought with the “mirroring” displays — identical staging, identical soundtrack, virtually the identical opening look — he supplied for his first ladies’s and males’s exhibits for Gucci. The mannequin who opened his newest present was Ana Rossolovich, the brand new face who launched his debut. He nonetheless feels she embodies his imaginative and prescient for the model. De Sarno is clearly not a designer who’s going to zap us with the shock of the brand new. There’s completely nothing fallacious with that. There’s just one Miuccia Prada, one Rick Owens on this world. However De Sarno closed the lure on himself when he pledged to “seize the extraordinary the place the peculiar is predicted.” I don’t anticipate the ‘peculiar’ — why promote your self brief? — however, in the identical vein, I additionally recognise how uncommon and treasured ‘the seize of the extraordinary’ is. Most of what I see unfolds in some middleman zone between the 2. Once more, nothing fallacious with that. So perhaps I ought to simply sit again and revel in De Sarno’s quest.

The story that his assortment advised was simply distilled into a number of key components. Closest to the designer’s coronary heart was certainly the very-long-over-very-short proportion involving these coats — impressively, virtually militarily, scaled — that he loves. Different outerwear staples — parkas, pea coats — have been cropped into boxy coat attire. A counterpoint was supplied by sheer lace lingerie/slip attire. And virtually all of it was anchored by both driving boots, evoking Gucci’s equestrian roots, or thigh boots. The present closed, as an example, with a black buster sheath slashed to simply under the groin, fluttering over black-leathered legs. The mannequin wore a chunky metallic choker which spelled out GUCCI.

That exact look cued the curiously fetishistic impression given off by the entire presentation. Perhaps that’s the place “obsessive repetition” leads. In Tom Ford’s day, such an impression would have been fairly deliberate. Hell, it was virtually a promoting level. Who even is aware of but what De Sarno’s promoting factors are? One factor he has in his favour is that he undoubtedly holds quick to a degree of view. How persuasive can such conviction be? Nicely, the über-influential musician Brian Eno as soon as proposed that repetition is a type of change. And alter is, in any case, the gasoline of vogue. So perhaps De Sarno’s grand design for Gucci is solely a sluggish reveal.

Maybe it’s too apparent to segue from Gucci to Tom Ford given the shared historical past of the manufacturers. Or perhaps that simply doesn’t matter provided that the comparability gives a peerlessly irresistible alternative to give attention to the challenges inherent in succeeding a charismatic, definitive character. Resist or embrace? Iconoclast or understudy? Peter Hawkings clearly loves being in management at Tom Ford after 25 years working as Ford’s proper hand. “I’m creating my girl, my man,” he mentioned emphatically earlier than his present on Thursday.

Hawkings insisted there was no archive-diving. It’s all ahead with Ford. If the shadow forged by his previous boss was so long as the spotlight-dappled catwalk within the outré revelation of clinging mesh or near-nude internet confections, Hawkings’s expertise as Ford’s menswear designer urged he was in all probability extra comfortable with the gold-buttoned navy appears or the pin-sharp tailoring of three-piece fits, worn shirtless by all genders. When he confirmed see-through flasher’s macs in latex, they have been primly buttoned to the throat. (His first perfume for the model is tellingly named Vanilla Intercourse.)

However Hawkings insisted the inspirational creature he had in thoughts for his assortment — his powerhouse spouse Whitney apart — was really the Pola Girl, the strong-shouldered dominatrix archetype who dominated photographer Helmut Newton’s fetishistic universe. “Highly effective, glamorous, free to be as dressed or undressed as she chooses,” was how he described her. Hawkings imagined his tailoring as a sort of armour, elevating her, maintaining her standing tall.

As ever with this model, the ladies have been ladies, and the boys got here throughout as boys by comparability. In that, Peter echoed his mentor Tom. There have been, in any case, no Pola Males in Newton’s world. On the identical time, Hawkings’s amped-up energy dressing — it’s rising as a serious pattern for subsequent season — underscored the clear irony that there’s scarcely been a time when folks had much less energy to affect on the occasions which can be shaping their lives, typically for the more severe. This was energy as cosplay, as a fantasy of escape even. The feeling was dislocating.