A "shameless and narcissistic declaration of love": Alessandro Michele borrows the words of Federico Fellini, spread in the hall at the end of the show, to explain what prompted him to tear the veil between inside and outside, behind the scenes and representation, putting everything together in what he does not hesitate to call "an almost religious rite". And so the Gucci fashion show for next winter tells of this "complex and almost sacred mechanism" which is not made only of clothes, but of everything that revolves around it.
And here, in the limelight, for the first time, hairdressers and make-up artists, dressers and style office workers, all in the gray "dream maker" uniform, co-stars of the show together with the audience watching them and participating in the ritual, anticipated by clues such as the voice message sent by Michele himself and by the photos that arrived on the guests' mobile phones a few hours before the show. As soon as we arrived, the surprise, behind the awning, not the hall, but the backstage, with models in bathrobes, make-up artists and hairdressers and he, the creative director, who wanders among the public and the professionals, stopping for a greeting with Florence Welch, Achille Lauro, Dakota Johnson.
In the room, a pink veil covers the circular platform that hides the second surprise: the lights go out, Federico Fellini's voice-over begins, which tells all the magic of cinema, from buying a ticket to choosing a seat in the room, and while the first notes of Ravel's Bolero spread the canvas falls to reveal the behind the scenes of each fashion show. And here are the stands with clothes and dressers ready to help models enter the part, or rather, the sacred representation, marked by a metronome that dominates the rotating scene like a music box. While the creative director-demiurge turns among the stands, one after the other the models go to position themselves on the circumference, crossed by a glass which - explains Michele - represents nothing more than the filter of the beholder.
"As a physicist - says the creative director - I tried to give shape to something abstract, then it was enough to put inside what is outside, in a shared ritual that I offer to those who are there and feel they are in that confession". A sense of sacredness that is reflected in the crucifix that accompanies the clothes and coats as a child, an obsession with the men's fashion show last month that also returns to the female, because "there is something perfect in these things as children, we see freedom and perfection is the world we would like: children are free and wonderful and what they bring is a fetish of freedom ". So here are the sailor coats, the English hats from childhood literature, the bows that look like those made by the mother at the last minute, the pleated skirts, the lace collars and the embroidered socks, the shoes with the eyes and the rhinestone headband. And then the ripped jeans and stockings, the leather collars and the mini fetish tops, the dresses with the crinoline and the flared trousers, the moccasins and the double-breasted coats with logo, in an invitation to "caress that human nostalgia - wrote Michele in protocol sheet distributed at the entrance of the show - which others call imperfection ".
