We really miss Michele

We Just Miss Michele

There is something strange about looking at Gucci now, and it may have less to do with Demna than with how completely Alessandro Michele changed our expectations of what Gucci could be. For seven years, Michele built a world so detached from ordinary reality that fashion started to feel like entering someone else's imagination rather than simply looking at clothes.

His Gucci was excessive, romantic and deeply personal, where a ruffled collar, strange brooch or oversized pair of glasses could suddenly feel essential because of the world around it. A Victorian blouse could sit beside a tracksuit, a grandmother's brooch next to an enormous fur coat, and somehow the combinations made sense once you accepted the logic of the universe.

Demna's Gucci asks a different question. It feels closer to the world we already inhabit, with sharper clothes, recognisable references and a more contemporary kind of provocation. That isn't necessarily a problem, but it can feel different after years of Michele's fantasy.

Maybe that is why the transition has been so difficult to process. Fashion audiences seem increasingly drawn towards things that feel fictional, strange or slightly removed from reality, and Michele was exceptionally good at creating exactly that. His Gucci gave us somewhere to go. Now we keep looking for the door back in.