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“Follow your heart” were the words emblazoned across the deep-red cover of a notebook sent to guests as part of the invitation to attend Gucci’s latest womenswear show — the second to be staged by creative director Sabato De Sarno.
It’s the kind of advice you might give to someone young — perhaps apt for the clientele that Gucci appears to be pursuing. For autumn/winter 2024, De Sarno presented a collection consisting of high hemlines, seen via short dresses or mini shorts and boxy jackets styled with knee-high boots. You could say there was a lot of leg.
There were some longer dresses: strapless or with a deep V neckline, held together by delicate lace. Some featured a jacquard print, but in any case were not as easily wearable because of the sheer material. The devil was in the details for masculine coats whose crystal embellishments sparkled on the catwalk, adding a feminine touch.
Two trails of fabric, swept behind the shoulders of garments like an untied ribbon and only noticeable from behind, moved freely as the models walked. They appeared throughout the collection, offering a recognisable element for red-carpet dressing and savvy consumers in the know, without the need for overt branding.
The show, held on the industrial grounds of the Fonderia Carlo Macchi, drew as many stars (Kirsten Dunst, Julia Garner, Daisy Edgar-Jones and Hanni, to name a few) as De Sarno’s debut, which marked a reset for Kering’s biggest brand. At €9.9bn in sales, Gucci brings in half of the French parent company’s revenue, but has been navigating declining sales amid a broader luxury slowdown.
While De Sarno’s collections have given Gucci new direction (the designer also applied a hyper-elevation approach to his first men’s outing in January), it remains to be seen whether he can help reignite sales with his designs, which arrived in stores at the beginning of this month. There’s certainly work to be done: sales at the brand were down 4 per cent year-on-year in the latest quarter ending December 31.
De Sarno said he sought “a small subversive gesture” and to “view things from a perspective different from what is presumed most appropriate, not following the rules”. Such is clear in the kind of sexiness seen today — which was not part of the brand’s DNA under former creative director Alessandro Michele, who ushered in a romantic and maximalist style during his seven-year tenure.
While Michele’s aesthetic was built on layering, offering consumers an eclectic collage of references that covered rather than revealed the body, De Sarno appears to be stripping back. His continued emphasis on the styles he introduced for his spring/summer 2024 debut suggests an intention to rewrite the house’s codes.
But, he also wants to take his time. “This is my way of dreaming, without hurry, visualising and stratifying aspirations as if they were the bricks of a house,” De Sarno said. “Search within the folds for a void that wants to be filled. Look at the detail very closely, before feeling free to back away in pursuit of a broader perspective. Capture the extraordinary where the ordinary is expected.”
Accessories, a big driver of revenues, were well represented in the form of a new top-handle bag, the GG Milano, and a half-moon silhouette inspired by equestrian motifs from the Gucci Archive. Horseriding boots featuring horsebit hardware came in two lengths — to the knee, or the thigh — and the towering platforms, an update of the brand’s top-selling horsebit loafers, are sure to be commercial successes.
While some designers approach fashion as a form of escapism, De Sarno’s outlook is to embrace the real world. “My dreams, as with my fashion, always converse with reality. Because I am not searching for another world to live in, but rather ways to live in this world,” he said.
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