Men's wear spring-summer 2015
collections walk on the wild side of fashion at the 86th edition
of Florence's Pitti Uomo trade fair wrapping up Friday.
If formal clothing has rediscovered the undying allure of
men's staples with a twist, from waistcoats to the slim-fitting
blue blazers famously donned by Italy's 39-year-old Florentine
Premier Matteo Renzi, casual clothes will be all about tropical
prints, flowers and colonial styles when temperatures start
soaring next year.
Angelo Nardelli 1951 vied for a 1970s look with a
collection dominated by flower patterns on both jackets and
pants.
Paolo Pecora Milano also dived into the botanical look with
tiny flowers on its 1950s-inspired ties and embossed on suits,
jackets and pants.
Marches tailor Lardini embraced next summer's soaring
horticultural fecundity with beautiful blooms on its most
elegant waistcoats.
From blooming Western gardens to Caribbean sunsets, fashion
savvy men next year will also be parading shirts, T-shirts and
shorts with a tropical inspiration.
Palms, lush undergrowth, hibiscus flowers and glimpses of
beaches and waterfalls are all over collections - from jackets
to jeans.
Colmar Originals went for flowers and hibiscus to decorate
the lining of its jackets while Italian shirt-makers Webb &
Scott vied for the Hawaii spirit along with hip artisan
shoemakers Raparo.
PT 01 - Pantaloni Torino launched a new line of chinos, the
Fiji, paying homage to the exotic islands with a color palette
of beiges and browns to give its pants a lived-in, discolored
look.
A cult brand of the 1980s, Mauna Kea, and Florence's iconic
jeans manufacturers Roy Roger's went for beach couture hailing
West Coast surf culture and East Coast glamour with flowers and
printed beach photos.
And the exotic hype is stretching from head to toe at Pitti
Uomo.
Men next summer will be able to step under the sun with a
flower-printed Stetson hat on their head and their feed clad in
Gallo's Reef socks, hailing coral barriers, inside tropically
inspired sneakers.
Indeed the sneakers elevated to fashion must by top
designers and trend setters like Marc Jacobs and Hedi Slimane
are one of the highlights of this Pitti Uomo edition.
Diadora heritage is nodding to the 1990s and this year's
World Cup while D'Acquasparta pays homage to tennis and
Wimbledon with vintage-looking sneakers.
Pantofola D'Oro is celebrating next year's rugby world cup
and Italy's iconic Superga tennis shoes are bowing to a range of
moods embracing Arabic-style patterns and the ever-popular
skulls.
And when the sun sets, if the summer breeze starts blowing
and temperatures drop by a few degrees, De Praio has designed
scarves for the boys with the omnipresent flower patterns and
tropical prints.
Elegance also has an exotic touch at Brunello Cucinelli.
The luxury brand's spring-summer collection was inspired by
three leading European capitals - Paris, London and Amsterdam -
yet in a color palette echoing the shades of Asia and Africa.
The youthful polish of Cucinelli's slim-fitting suits was
enhanced by colonial and exotic nuances of beiges and blues with
touches of saffron, curry and orange inspired by spices.
And if menswear labels are eyeing faraway countries for
inspiration, data released on the eve of Pitti Uomo by the
federation of Italian fashion businesses Sistema Moda Italia,
showed foreign markets are also very good for business.
Exports in 2013 registered 4.3% growth worth 5.3 billion
euros for Italian menswear labels - helping the sector's
revenues as domestic sales shrank 9.3% while Italy was
struggling out of its longest and deepest postwar recession.
Overall, Italian menswear was worth 8.5 billion euros in
2013.
While growth across EU markets remained stable - up 1.4% -
the 1,090 companies presenting their spring-summer collections
at Florence's Forezza da Basso will be vying in particular for
markets outside Europe which registered a 7.4% hike last year,
led by South Korea with a 35% increase, China with 29.5% and
Hong Kong with 18%.
Traditional markets also grew, notably the US up 2%, Russia
up 1.2% and Japan, which registered a 0.7% increase.
According to data released by Italian statistics bureau
Istat, exports will keep growing this year with a 4.7% increase
already recorded in the first two months of 2014 on the same
period last year.
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