Gucci wants to redesign the fashion system
Throughout his five years at the head of Gucci, Alessandro Michele has proven to be one of the designers who has best read the needs and drives of society;a creator whose risky decisions - from the suppression of the sales to the commitment to a diverse and inclusive beauty canon - have ended up being imitated by the rest of the fashion industry.Therefore, the change of strategy he confirmed Monday at a press conference takes special relevance.Through videoconference, the Roman creator presented a new business model that is based on the drastic reduction in the number of annual collections, which will go from eight to two.
Thus, Michele puts Gucci again at the head of the sector, making it the first great brand to flank the slowdown in the rhythms in the production, sale and promotion of its proposals.A paradigm shift that other prominent designers, such as Dries Van Noten, have claimed and that some, such as Armani, have begun to apply staggeredly.In all cases, with the crisis of Coronavirus as a trigger."We have gone too far, our reckless actions have set fire to the home in which we live," the Roman reflected.
Michele has confirmed that his two collections will include garments of men and women and will not respond to the "old ritual of the seasons" spring-summer, autumn-inverno.“I consider them poor and obsolete terms.Tags of an impersonal speech that lost its meaning.Containers that gradually disconculate the life that generated them and ended up losing contact with reality, ”she explained in some notes that she has been publishing these last days in the Gucci Instagram account.
The brand will not participate next September at Milan Fashion Week.“In our case it is impossible.I am glad if other companies with the capable of arriving in time to this event, but we want to start driving other bars, ”Michele argued.And although he did not make it clear if they will integrate again in the official Italian calendar, he does not seem to want to go for free in this adventure.“I would like to go through this path with others and encourage them to rethink that doing five shows a year is bad for creativity.I have done it because I am hyperproductive, but that can also be a disease. ”
In his opinion, the parades, like the entire fashion system, will not be the same after the Coronavirus.“If it depended on me, I would always make them open door, I love to reinvent them.But our creativity must adapt to new visual languages.Perhaps, even if we are not live, we will see each other again. ”Michele already communicated with a very important part of the audience, which, in his opinion, transcended the buyers of large surfaces and specialized journalists years ago.“The fashion world has become a kind of Woodstock.There is a global community that follows us through many media. ”
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Faced with the intention of producing less and more reasonably, sales objectives and business expectations are raised.How Gucci will maintain a turnover in which capsule pre -lections and collections were so important, with only two collections a year is the question of 10,000 million euros.“The most important thing is to want to do it.Wish.It may seem crazy, but this model will also allow clothes to be more time and have a longer life in stores.Anyway, since I am in Gucci there is a team that has always been successful when it comes to translating my creativity in business and I am sure that this time they will also surprise us. ”
By showing once again his passion for semiotics, the designer has also decided to rename the collections with terms belonging to the semantic field of classical music.“There will be symphonies, rapsodias, madrigals, nightlife, oberturas, concerts and minuets in the constellation of my creative path.After all, music travels beyond borders, restoring the link between fragility and infinity. ”
Although it has been the first to embrace a paradigm shift, Gucci is not the only brand that during the Covid crisis has put on the table the need to regenerate a fashion industry increasingly away from contemporary sensibilities and needs. To begin with, the associations of creators of the United Kingdom and the United States- the British fashion Council (BFC) and the Council of Fashion Designers of America (CFDA)- have recommended to their members that “they focus on no more than two main collections to the year". Giorgio Armani, on the other hand, will summarize his two haute couture parades in one, which will be held this January in Milan and not in Paris, as was happening so far. It shows autumn-winter and spring-summer joints together. In the same way, the Italian will only organize an Emporio Armani parade that will take place in September. In addition, he studies the possibility of stopping collections of prefall and cruise (those that arrive at stores in June and December, respectively). Armani's goal, as confirmed in an interview with El País Weekly, is "to lower the rhythm, show less collections and return to a position in which consumers' real demands are taken into consideration."
Saint Laurent also, belonging to the Keing group as Gucci, has announced that it will not participate in Paris Fashion Week next September and that it will reorganize its agenda to show its proposals throughout the year.
Restructure the calendars of the parades is one of the main demands of a group of designers and distributors capitanened by the creator Dries Van Noten, and that has among their ranks with firms such as Marine Serre and Gabriella Hearst and shopping centers of the weight of Nodstrom, Selfridgesor Bedgorf Goodman.In a letter published in mid -May, they ask that sales campaigns be adjusted to the stations and that the sales are delayed.That is, summer collections are in the stores from February to July;and winter, from August to January."It is not normal to buy winter clothes in May," summarizes Van Note.
