Vogue on: Dolce & Gabbana

From Vogue’s ‘Glamour is Back’ issue in November 1993, Nick Knight shoots Linda Evangelista in Dolce & Gabbana’s black satin-backed crêpe dress with ‘vermicelli’ straps, under a patchworked chiffon and lace shirt with ruffle front.

So, returning somewhat closer to home for spring 1994, they looked to what Gabbana described as ‘parts of the Mediterranean we consider hidden treasures’ for a collection that drew on the theatrical (contrasting the operatic volumes of Maria Callas’ stage costumes with refined, androgynous silhouettes based on ‘The Tramp’-era Charlie Chaplin), with exotic fabrics and embellishments drawn from the extremities of the Mediterranean, from Northern Africa to the Near East. Soft black veils indicated ‘an innocence’ the pair cited as reflecting a softer, less aggressive sexuality, as well as a way to ‘still use transparent fabrics without revealing too much skin’. Called Mediterraneo, the collection also explored the myriad cultural influences that have influenced the label’s spiritual home of Sicily over centuries of international invasion, thus allowing them to reconcile a wide selection of themes yet remain true to the character of the label.

As well as finding new inspirations, Dolce & Gabbana explored experimental fabric combinations, displayed by Amber Valletta to startling effect in a herringbone tweed and PVC double-breasted jacket with fake-fur collar and cuffs, photographed by Mario Testino in 1994.

Another central pillar of Dolce & Gabbana is the mastery of feminine tailoring. This was explored through 113 different fabrics in the New Rock ’n’ Roll collection for autumn/winter 1994, a remarkable expression of their skill in interpreting the traditions of men’s suiting for the modern woman. Snippy short skirt suits in tough worsted and full-length black sheaths with short trains paired with flat brogues displayed a masculine-feminine quality. The contrast of tradition and forward-thinking was encapsulated in tweed overlaid with transparent PVC, a ‘projection into the future’ interpreted with complete confidence for Vogue by Mario Testino in a shot of Amber Valletta, tidying her brow at the bathroom mirror, in a herringbone jacket with the lower half replaced with the see-through plastic, showing both her and Dolce & Gabbana’s own perfectly-pitched cheek.

Cinema had first enraptured the designers with singular heroines, but by the mid-Nineties Dolce & Gabbana took a look at the medium with new breadth and depth, incorporating a cinematic quality into the brand at all levels, from the presentation of catwalk collections to its advertising campaigns. As modern starlets flocked to wear the label on the red carpet and at work and play, Dolce & Gabbana looked back to Hollywood’s Golden Age with the spring/summer 1995 Hollywood Glamour collection. Drawing on the powerfully seductive adoption of the man’s smoking jacket and silk pyjama, as done by early twentieth-century starlets and another Dolce & Gabbana style heroine, Coco Chanel, the cinematic tone was enhanced by the return of Isabella Rossellini to the catwalk, whom the pair described backstage as ‘the symbol of an Italian woman who lives outside of Italy’. Rossellini was joined by actress Monica Bellucci, continuing the film-star theme, who had been modelling for the label since 1989 and had starred in their self-titled debut fragrance campaign in 1995. For Vogue, the story was captured in a Raymond Meier close-up of Yasmeen Ghauri nestled in glittery blue Busby Berkeley-style crescent moon. Contemporary Hollywood was brought in via Drew Barrymore’s appearance in the magazine as a modern-day Mae West in Dolce & Gabbana’s lingerie lace. Dolce & Gabbana remained on a cinematic note for autumn/winter 1995 where they based a collection on Luis Buñuel’s seminal film Belle de Jour, a reference that allowed them to mix cinema, sex and subversion in an immensely saleable selection of neat wool skirt suits, A-line dresses and coats. By March 1995 Dolce & Gabbana had dressed their first Oscar-winner, placing Susan Sarandon in mocha-hued full-skirted satin to collect her Best Actress award for Dead Man Walking.

However subversive their inspiration, Dolce & Gabbana’s superbly tailored neat skirt suits were perfect for the working woman’s wardrobe. In strawberry-milkshake-shaded crêpe, model Yasmeen Ghauri is at once arch and innocent in pin-sharp pencil skirt and matching jacket, photographed by Neil Kirk in 1995.

Overleaf In a feather shrug and diamanté-peppered pink crêpe from the spring/summer 1995 Hollywood Glamour collection Ghauri returns nestled in the crescent of a shiny blue moon. Photograph by Raymond Meier.

For many, the perfect marriage of Italy and cinema lies in the work of Federico Fellini, and his wit and subversion make him a perfect inspiration for Dolce & Gabbana. His heroines had appeared in collections from the start, but his films were now directly referenced, first in autumn/winter 1996’s Le Notti di Cabiria-inspired collection. As Domenico Dolce explained, the ideas originated from a single still, of a woman in a herringbone coat getting into a car. ‘All you see is her back, and a flash of black-seamed stockings as she climbs in.’