A little Jackie O, a little archive, delivered with street attitude and a whole lot of Roman allure. Such were the elements comprising Pierpaolo Piccioli’s feisty-chic resort collection for Valentino
Once again, Piccioli presented the Valentino collection in New York, at the grand James B. Duke mansion on East 78th Street. Though he loves New York and remains dedicated to showing his pre-seasons here, this time around his heart was back in Rome, though not the city of romantic cliché.
“Rome is layers and layers,” Piccioli said. “I wanted to capture the life of the street but in a very personal way. Rome isn’t only a postcard, it’s the harmony of many layers together — Baroque, paganism, angels, industrial, the churches, all of it. When you think street, you think New York. But Rome also has a contemporary street life.”
Piccioli thus commissioned photographer Andrea Spotorno to shoot the look book there, not the “postcard Rome,” but the little corners, all around.” There is indeed a “Jackie O in Italy” vibe, both in the immediacy of the shots (think paparazzi) and in the styling, with head scarves and giant glasses punctuating most of the looks by Valentino.
The designer’s approach to the shoot parallels that which he took to the collection itself, mixing scarf logos, denim, mannish suitings, gentle eyelets, structure and flou, often shown in states of extreme counterpoint.
“I wanted to create the harmony that comes from different identities mixed together, different cultures mixed together,” Piccioli said.
“Today, it’s important to allow people to express themselves through pieces that have their own identity but can be mixed many different ways. Everyone can do it in their own way.”
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