Prada’s Spring Summer 2023 Menswear was one of the most highly anticipated shows at Milan Fashion week. Raf Simons and Miuccia Prada combined to create their most harmonious collection yet. The Spring Summer 2023 collection captures the formality that Prada is synonymous with and the playful, boyish edge that Simons brings.
The show’s backdrop resembled an exaggeratedly proportioned house, made from a similar raw-edged paper used for the invite. Exquisite tailoring appeared in muted colours at Fondazione Prada. The collection is titled Prada Choices, and the garments showcased in Milan were an expression of choice.
Well-known garments are reinvented through context. Based on the idea that design is a practice of decision-making, the collection is made up of direct, recognisable, and archetypal pieces in the form of suits, overcoats, sweaters, shirts, denim, and leather is a menswear staple. For Prada, these wardrobe staples became the subject that goes into the complexity of creating it – a process of refinement that uncovered the fundamentals of dressing.
Models were dressed either up or down in mixed and matched looks. Suits were exaggerated on the shoulders, puckered, pinched in the right areas, and nipped at the waist. Knitwear came in the form of skin-tight fits that accentuated natural body shapes. Miuccia Prada and Raf Simons focused on the important aspects of dressing.
The collection is evocative of youth and represents energy and vitality. The clothing exudes lightness and freshness, which allows the body to move freely, allowing the wearer innate freedom and joy. Shorts came in leather with metal hardware, while overcoats were crafted from red, pink, and blue checkered cloth.
“We are attracted to the idea of ‘normal’ clothing — to classic pieces, archetypes, the garderobe. But the same garment in different materializations changes their language entirely; they function in different ways. Then mixing that with other pieces transforms it again. Every garment is simple, direct, pure, but there is a complexity to their combinations and context,” Raf Simons said. “The garments are classic, but their mix contradicts, making them exciting and new. There is leather against the body, then cotton on top — there’s a kind of anti-logic to the combination of the clothes, oddness. A combination of rawness and sophistication in these clothes is also important. The contrast of classicism and spontaneity lends it a sensitivity and motion.”
Prada Spring-Summer 2023 is about giving the wearer choices. It’s about understanding the complexity behind the simple.
Images: Supplied
