Gucci creative director Alessandro Michele has been looking to transcend the runway show, and the coronavirus pandemic has provided an apt moment.
Michele teamed up with American film director Gus Van Sant to create a seven-part miniseries revealing Gucci’s latest collection, titled “Ouverture.” The videos will be trickled out a day at a time starting Monday in the format of a virtual film festival and will be streamed on YouTube, Weibo and GucciFest.com.
Michele announced in May that he was breaking with the tradition of the four-times-a-year runway show, often punctuated with an additional destination cruise show. Gucci will now roll out largely seasonless collections in November and April. It’s hard to say what he might have done if the pandemic hadn’t in some ways made a virtual presentation a necessity — especially as the virus makes a resurgence.
A film buff since childhood, Michele said he was discussing another project with Van Sant before the pandemic and proposed the miniseries project just a month ago. Van Sant traveled to Rome, where he filmed part of “My Private Idaho” 30 years ago, to shoot on location.
“It was a spontaneous idea to make something within just a few weeks. I sort of found that exciting and challenging, like something I had done before,” the director said, recalling his work on “Gerry,” “Elephant” and “Last Days,” which he said were filmed on tight schedules with loose screenplays.
The film series follows days in the life of a woman, played by Italian actress Silvia Calderoni, as she and her Gucci tribe move dreamily through a rarefied Roman landscape. She is joined by Gucci models with cameos by friends of Michele’s, including Billie Eilish, Florence Welch and Harry Styles, all wearing Gucci looks that will be in stores starting next spring.
“There is a cinematic fusing with commerce,” Van Sant said.
