Two Italian designers showcasing spring-summer 2015 women's collections in Paris have embraced nature to convey a stream of concepts in one artful package.
At Giambattista Valli's ready-to-wear runway, crisp silhouettes played backdrop to blossoming branches sprayed over pants and dresses, or embroidered in macramé lace on skirts.
But if Valli's flowers paid homage to a very contemporary ability to strike a balance between industrial and artisanal design, Emanuel Ungaro's creative director Fausto Puglisi used blossoms to rediscover Ungaro's aesthetic while giving it a new spin. At Valli, the romantic mood was downplayed by stripes or black tear-drop prints echoing a Joan Mirò painting while the industrial quality of the fabrics also set the tone, playing for contrast.
The Rome-born designer's fascination with Japan's Metabolist movement from the 1960s and 1970s shaped his willingness to embrace the duality of mass production and craft.
Valli now has three lines to his name including haute couture, the main ready-to-wear line and the new Giamba label - after his nickname - which he has just presented at the Milan shows, and which sells 30-40% less than his main line.
The designer believes he has reached a defining point in his career.
"If haute couture is about the art of the atelier, this line is all about the meeting of art with industrial design," he said of his main ready-to-wear line, which debuted in 2005.
This translated into superbly accurate proportions taking Valli's trademark femininity into new territory - the world without limits of a globetrotting woman, her mysterious appeal enhanced by Luigi Scialanga's silver-disc jewellery. The designer chosen by human rights lawyer Amal Alamuddin to make her first public appearance in Venice as the brand-new Mrs. George Clooney also gave a 1970s spin to a number of key collection pieces - further confirmation that this is the favorite decade of the spring-summer 2015 collections.
Flattering flared pants were mixed with tunics or three-quarter sleeve coats, while Valli's staple shift dresses were presented in a fresh palette of crisp white, soft pink and black.
At Ungaro, Puglisi debuted pyjama pants and very short dresses skilfully embroidered in Italy with tiny paillettes in bold shades of yellow, red and turquoise with a touch of black and white.
"Emanuel Ungaro crafted a sexy and feminine woman whom I revered, while making her modern," said Puglisi, the Sicilian designer who was appointed creative director of Ungaro two years ago in a bid to resurrect the failing French fashion house.
Puglisi has creative control while Aeffe, which also controls Alberta Ferretti and Moschino, holds the license for the global production and distribution of the brand's clothing and accessories.
Puglisi worked with draping - "something I had never done before," he said - on jerseys, lace and cotton in block colours and rocking flower prints to shape "a woman who is so free she can play and have fun fearlessly".
This in-your-face femininity is suitable for day and night, as befits the tight agenda of contemporary women: "Each piece can be easily worn around the clock," Puglisi vowed.
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