Milan fashion week Dolce & Gabbana and Prada
Sultry, Sexy Sirens: DOLCE & GABBANA and PRADA Celebrate a Return to the Eternal Allure of the Body.
All Image Credit Milan Fashion Week and Brands Featured
A glittery gladiator skirt and bra top ooze sexiness – at Dolce & Gabbana
The fashion world has been through a traumatic 18 months. We’ve seen how slowly but surely the various global Fashion Weeks and their respective design houses have responded to (what we hope to be) the back end of a pandemic that hugely affected not only all of our lives but also the greater Fashion Industry.
Fashion trends come in periodical ebbs and flows and it seems Fashion has reached one of those critical turning points, just like it has done numerous times throughout history when significant social events have occurred. All of a sudden we notice that frocks are sexier, smaller, shorter, tighter, more transparent and revealing, that heels are higher and pieces of jewellery flashier than they’ve been for a very, very long time.
Milan Fashion Week SS 2022 has produced a range of deliciously self-indulgent offerings and to our delight, given us a completely fresh new direction on fashion going forward.
Overwhelming there’s been a trend to seek pleasure and – obviously! – being suitably dressed for the occasion, case in point being Fendi’s disco divas and Roberto Cavalli and Missoni’s sexy sirens. All of a sudden there’s a new motto: out with the demure and well-behaved, we just want to have F-U-N!
The undisputed heavyweight duos of Italian fashion – Domenico Dolce and Stefano Gabbana of powerhouse Dolce & Gabbana and Miuccia Prada and Raf Simon of Prada – have revealed their hands too, and believe me, come any closer and you’d be burning your fingers! These collections are sizzlingly, scorchingly, blisteringly hot!
A sizzlingly hot lace-up bodycon dress with balconette top – at Dolce & Gabbana
Dolce & Gabbana returned to a moment in their glorious design past – the year 2000 to be precise – to reinvent what to Gen Zs, may now pass as ‘vintage’ pieces. The venue at the Metropol came complete with a polished mirrored runway and countless illuminating spotlights to do justice to the kilograms of rhinestones, beads and crystals that literally dripped off the clothes.
The uber sexy 2000 ‘diva on steroids’-look was to be seen everywhere on Dolce & Gabbana’s stage: back lace tops reminiscent of the Nougthies underneath leather biker’s jackets were worn over the skimpiest of miniskirts, bikinis were dripping with rhinestones, there were sex-oozing animal prints, lacy balconette bra tops, low-rise ripped jeans and midriff-baring bodycon dresses.
Chinzy blouses came with exaggerated, oversized leg-of-mutton sleeves, killer skin-tight leather trousers laced up from waist to ankle and dresses were metallic, swishy, transparent and left little to the imagination. There were Spice Girl-esque camouflage trousers and coats, multi-coloured rhinestone-encrusted jackets, gladiator paneled miniskirts, chokers, studded double wraparound belts reminiscent of the Eighties, sky-high stilettos and Barbie-like fringed boots.
Camouflage jackets and cargo trousers were some of the upcycled gems in the collection together with retro logo-ed T-shirts that won’t look out of place in the wardrobe of a groupie from the early 2000s. All in all it is a collection that shouts for joy! Skirts couldn’t get any shorter, blouses would struggle to be any clingier and revealing and stilettos couldn’t legitimately get any higher!
Watch the video of Dolce & Gabbana’s show here:
Black lace lingerie and stilettos, a look reminiscent of the Noughties – at Dolce & Gabbana
A tuxedo bodysuit revealing glimpses of lingerie – at Dolce & Gabbana
A rhinestone-encrusted coat, boots and boxy bag worn with leopard print shorts – at Dolce & Gabbana
A hip-accentuating lace-up dress – at Dolce & Gabbana
Transparent floaty animal prints over lacy lingerie – at Dolce & Gabbana
A vintage-look floral shirt with Seventies collar worn over a miniscule miniskirt and killer boots – at Dolce & Gabbana
A floaty leopard print trapeze micro mini dress – at Dolce & Gabbana
A chinzy oversized leg-of-mutton sleeved blouse over low-slung rhinestone-encrusted jeans – at Dolce & Gabbana
A lacy top over low-slung chartreuse slacks, with lingerie peeking out – at Dolce & Gabbana
An Eighties-style boxy Chanel-inspired chain-detailed jacket over ripped jeans – at Dolce & Gabbana
The ultimate bodycon dress – revealing all! – at Dolce & Gabbana
Elegant and super sexy – at Dolce & Gabbana
Crystal-encrusted inner/ outerwear for the super confident – at Dolce & Gabbana
A swishy Twenties-inspired flapper dress covered in rhinestones – at Dolce & Gabbana
Exquisite exaggerated sleeves in zebra print worn over stovepipe jeans and strappy stilettos – at Dolce & Gabbana
Lace, straps, lace-ups and a double-belt, blisteringly hot! – at Dolce & Gabbana
Blood red satin stiletto boots for a Dolce & Gabbana siren
The ever forward-thinking Prada pulled off a double feat: Miuccia Prada and Raf’s Simon’s collaboration saw them showing simultaneously, matching piece for piece, a SS 2022 collection in both Milan and Shanghai. Large LED screens enabled the audience at the Fondazione Prada to see the parallel show in Shangai live, as it was happening.
In line with the current trend of ‘sexiness’ – as seen on the catwalks, in the fashion industry and on the streets – Prada presented a collection that popped with miniscule miniskirts, gritty leather jackets and transparent lingerie. Over the past season there’s been a movement gathering huge momentum to embrace and celebrate the body: clothes designed to accentuate and reveal, not cover up! There’s no doubt clothes have become shorter, more revealing, clingier and more transparent. These are clothes for the body-confident!
No wonder the collection is entitled ‘Seduction, Stripped Down’! Miuccia Prada, always a few steps ahead of the rest of the pack and perfectly in tune with (if not ever so slightly ahead of) the zeitgeist of the moment, has knocked on the head precisely what the average fashion-wearer would want to sport in the wake of a pandemic. She said in her press notes, “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. Using these ideas, these references to historical pieces, the collection is an investigation of what they mean today.”
These pieces are indeed modern and sharp, powerful and seductive whilst giving a nod to the past. The duchesse satin miniskirts in chartreuse and shocking pink were tiny but packed a punch. The oversized ribbon trains attached to skirts and dresses were a reminder of the unapologetic femininity of these pieces, as were the bra cups fitted into the ribbed sweaters. The conventional midi dresses, unbuttoned at the back to reveal glimpses of lingerie, again, spoke of an elegant nonchalance and inner confidence. Pointy kitten heels were another little touch that reminded one of a period when sexiness was positively embraced and celebrated.
For a long period over the past decade in mainstream fashion, body consciousness was a trend that was frowned upon. Somehow right now this sexiness feels fresh and new and right … perhaps it took a pandemic to make us realize that life is short, that being confident in our bodies and celebrating sensuality is okay after all.
Watch the video of Prada’s show here:
A sharp black pencil skirt, killer pointy slingbacks and a crisp white shirt – at Prada
Sexy red lace in this sheath dress, worn with canary yellow pointy heels – at Prada
Corset details elevate a ribbed cardi – at Prada
Short and sharp: a blouse with endearing details worn with acid green kitten heels – at Prada
A gritty leather jacket worn with a miniskirt with midi train – at Prada
Bra cups add a feminine detail to a simple sweater – at Prada
Simple, sharp, sexy and perfectly modern – at Prada
Bordeau shade rib knits with built-in bra cups worn over an acid yellow satin skirt – at Prada
This elegant dress reveals more than a glimpse of lingerie from behind – at Prada
Sixties-inspired grass green belted ensembles worn with tangerine low heels– at Prada
A pink satin dress may appear demure from the front, but the back is a different story altogether! – at Prada
