Dolce & Gabbana

Church. Dolce & Gabbana Alta Sartoria 2025

| Design & Culture by Ed

It’s been years since I wrote about a Dolce & Gabbana show. But this one caught my attention for all the right – and maybe not so right – reasons.

The haute couture season doesn’t really end until Dolce & Gabbana says the last word with its opulent, over-the-top alta moda shows (there are three of them: for jewellery, womenswear and menswear). They are presented not in Paris, but in Italy – that explains why it’s off the official couture schedule.

Most of the time I don’t engage with what contemporary Dolce & Gabbana does. Yet I have a sentiment for old Dolce & Gabbana, especially from the 1980s, 1990s, when the designers dissected the codes of Italianity and created an entire visual lexicon that was very rawn and undiluted. And I must admit that the brand’s latest Alta Sartoria collection – which goes for menswear couture – presented not just anywhere in Rome, but at the steps of Castel San’Angelo – and with IRL bishops in attendance – is really something worth analyzing. READ MY FULL REVIEW HERE.

Collage by Edward Kanarecki.
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NET-A-PORTER Limited

#TBT: Dolce & Gabbana’s 2001

| Design & Culture by Ed

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Actually, Dolce & Gabbana used to great fashion before it became commercial, millenial-loving (duh) trash. With a backdrop of blossoming trees and lace curtains, Stefano and Domenico‘s glitzy glamour met power-dressing and… Madonna! I guess the fans of Material Girl went through an orgy after they saw those heavily beaded T-shirts with the musician’s most iconic album covers (as pictured above in Steven Meisel’s advertising campaign starring Gisele Budchen). But in 2001, Dolce & Gabbana brought some of the most chic suits to their runway, as well as Monica Belluci approved sheer eveningwear. Those were the times.

 

TBT: Dolce & Gabbana AW04

| Design & Culture by Ed

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Today, looking at a Dolce & Gabbana show hurts. The brand’s recent strategy to lure rich millenials through casting Instagram stars for their runway is, politely saying, ridiculous. Also, I don’t feel like writing much about Domenico and Stefano‘s pride in dressing America’s First Lady, or the latter’s drive for dramas and beefs on social media. But, even though it’s hard to believe it in 2017, Dolce & Gabbana used to do fashion. And really good fashion. Autumn-winter 2004 season is a great example of that. Inspired with Helmut Newton’s photographs and muses, the designer’s collection was about a hedonistic, ultra-chic, dramatic, yet powerful woman. Lots of sheerness, romantic lace, sassy fur, seductive satin – that was extremely Dee-Gee at the beginning of the millennium.  The models – from Stella Tennant and Mariacarla Boscono to Nadja Auermann and Karen Elson – killed the audience with their walks.