Bottega Veneta proves again that theirs is one of the best shows in Milan

Just into his fourth season, Matthieu Blazy showed that he is the guy to lead Bottega Veneta into the multi-billion euro brand status (revenue of 1.7 billion euro was achieved last year) that parent company Kering is aiming for, even with the seeming simplicity of his past three collections. Mr Blazy’s remarkable accomplishment has dimmed the memory of the brand veering towards bankruptcy in 2001 until Domenico De Sole and the then-riding-high Tom Ford initiated an acquisition under what was formerly the Gucci Group. Tomas Maier was appointed the creative director, changing the entire course of the brand’s forward trajectory. We stayed up for the livestream of the brand’s spring/summer 2024 collection (2am!) And could not sleep afterwards. There was too much to unpack. We watched the show again.

This season, an intensity of ideas. Mr Blazy is good with tailoring, with knitwear, with leather, and delectable much between. This is not to say that there was a thoughtless amalgam of techniques or fabrics, or looks (although the soundtrack was a catchily percussive mash-up that included spoken words, birdsong, burble, Fleetwood Mac’s Dreams and Andrea Bocelli’s Con Te Partirò). Far from it. Material manipulation resigned, even if there was no innovation that equalled the faded jeans that was not of his very first season. And, yes, essentials seemed to still be the crux of the collection, but all of the pieces had that little more—subtle and yet not quite—that augmented the sureness that you were looking at something special, and that deserved a visit to the store when they arrive a few months later. By the time the two pom-pom dresses (they were re not as kitschy as how we have described them) came out, which was towards the end, it was a decision-making moment: which key piece—or how many—would you buy?

Mr Blazy worked with considerable craft (we mean skill, not the the flogged-to-death craft in craftsmanship—the favourite expression of museum curators here). From the subtle incline of the shoulders of the blazers to the cincture that framed the top left of a bustier-dress to the angle of the diagonal leather strips that formed tops and skirts to tops of trousers that unfurled from the waist, there was deliberate (even meditative) consideration in how every cut, every line, or every texture affects the trinity of proportion, harmony, and unity nudged the clothes way beyond the ordinary. The knits—three-dimensionally fashioned—had the rarity of form that could have been the result of pairing a grandmother and a yarn artist. The leathers, so supple on the body, makes you forget that they were, in fact, skin. Sometimes, you could not make out where one part of a dress began and where it ended. One had collars that somehow spread out into dolman sleeves.

Although the collection urged us to go on a “trip”, the destination was unclear, so too the geographical/cultural reference. On the floor of the runway, tiles in swimming-pool blue showed a cartoonish map of a world not immediately discernible, on which there were fishes and birds in happy coexistence. At first, we thought this was going to be a sea-side outing, more so when the first outfit was a black one-piece bathing suit and the model carried a basket-weave tote that looked ready for the beach. But that was completely reversed when the follow-up look was a decidedly more serious, more dressed-up suit. The journey, we realised, was not going to be linear or even coastal. The show’s soundtrack, at one point, persuaded: “let’s go somewhere”. Bottega Veneta did take us around, and the jaunt had the rare fashion week quality—enthralling.

Screen shot (top): Bottega Veneta/ YouTube. Photos: gorunway.com