Versace’s new guy Dario Vitale makes sexiness acceptable for the masses, and that is the heart of the matter: Once it’s this wearable, it’s tame

The collection threw its first curve ball with look number three, a real head-scratcher. It comprised of a gender-neutral white V-neck tank top with the armhole cut wide and so deep, it went straight to the waist of the denim mom-jeans. The ensemble was strapped across in the middle by a leather belt, punctuated at the centre with a beaming, square, gold buckle, as if saying an awkward ”oh”. Whatever sexiness there was in all that, it did not bring to mind the work of either Gianni Versace himself or his sister, Donatella, now the label’s chief brand ambassador. Rather, it was the relative of what you often see after work, the gym bunny, after his workout that yielded results deserving it sartorial spotlight.

Versace announced in July that, in place of a spectacle that has been their runway presentation, they will go with what was described as an “intimate” event. That, to us, was disconcerting. What was Versace putting together that did not deserve a full, staged narrative? Why the intimacy if this was not an alta moda outing? Has Versace, perhaps, identified a creative weakness? It is tempting to think that Dario Vitale, Ms Versace’s successor, was not ready with a vision that would warrant a major Kleiged-up catwalk. At the Pinacoteca Ambrosiana, a cosy museum in Milan that houses Leonardo da Vinci’s drawings, Mr Vitale unveiled his bumbling proclamation that Versace remains Versace while becoming Miu Miu.

While he did away with sides of what could have first been tees (there were shirted versions, too), Mr Vitale also bulked up jackets, blousons, and truckers, all familiar outers from whence he came. Even vests were up-sized, as though the weather’s wardrobe has been built from thrift-shop hauls. Much of the collection had that anti-fit sensibility that once dominated Gucci. So vaguely affiliated with the body the clothes were that jeans and pants had to be worn with splayed-open flies that suggested zip closures were operating on a decorative suggestion of functionality. If this was just styling, as some Netizens had suggested, then it was an excess of cleverness. Versace has always been about the fit, even when the cut was relaxed. Mr Vitale taking liberties with it created a grevious misalignment of temperament.

He told the media that “mythology started when gods and goddesses were a bit bored of having affairs with themselves, so they descended Mount Olympus to walk among men.” But the point isn’t about wearability, it is about worship. And that communion was not happening because there was a crisis of faith. The union of Miu Miu’s geeky chic—all awkwardness, layering, and intellectual irony—with Versace’s once-unapologetic sexiness for the red carpet did not point to marital bliss. In making the iconic brazenness of Versace palatable and current, Dario Vitale offered a weak, diluted synthesis that proved that when you try to make a provocative goddess wearable, you just clear the altar. Ultimately, it boils down to one important reaction: whether Jennifer Lopez will take the bait.

Photos: Versace