The creative director released “La Famiglia,” a 38-look collection, online a day ahead of his scheduled Milan Fashion Week show.
Summary
- For his Gucci debut, Demna released an online lookbook titled “La Famiglia” just before Milan Fashion Week.
- The collection establishes a broad spectrum of characters, from traditionally elegant figures to provocative party-goers, to define a new Gucci identity.
- Demna integrates his own design signatures with select items from the Gucci archive, using them to build out the world of these new personalities.
In a deliberate digital-first move, Demna released a teaser of his debut collection for Gucci not on a Milanese runway, but through a lookbook that appeared online a day before the house’s scheduled show. Titled “La Famiglia” and photographed by Catherine Opie, the collection acts as an opening statement, presenting a wide-ranging cast of characters that map out the designer’s new vision for the Italian brand.
The collection’s narrative unfolds through these personalities, which are meant to explore different facets of the Gucci identity. The breadth of this new “family” is the central message. A “Direttore” in a sharp black suit exists in the same album as a “Partyboy,” whose glistening vest and open silk shirt suggest a different kind of formality. Demna’s own aesthetic appears in the form of broad shoulders and oversized silhouettes, but it’s contextualized within this character study. For instance, the “Figo” wears a sleek leather biker jacket over a bare chest, while the “Nerd” is styled in a knit vest featuring the house’s classic 1970s stripes paired with trousers bearing small horsebit hardware.
Demna anchors these modern characters in Gucci’s history by selectively reintroducing archival pieces. The GG monogram, for example, is applied head-to-toe on some looks, a maximalist gesture. Heritage items like the Bamboo 1947 bag are re-proportioned for this new context, and the iconic Horsebit loafer from 1953 reappears. The styling itself reinterprets tradition with a sense of nonchalance, or sprezzatura, demonstrated by soft leather mules worn with the heels stepped-in.
This initial offering is a work of contrasts. The silhouettes span from a maximalist feathered opera coat to minimalist, seamless hosiery garments. The idea of glamour is also applied to menswear, with items like transparent bodycon sets and sophisticated black-tie swimwear suggesting a new take on evening attire. More than a full collection, “La Famiglia” serves as a prologue, establishing the aesthetic vocabulary Demna will build upon for his first physical runway show in February.
