Gaia Trussardi s challenge is to balance the backstory of her label with its contemporary reality. Trussardi is more than a century old and family owned, with a justifiable pride in its history and a predilection for keeping business and blood closely intertwined. (Members of the Trussardi family don t just own, run, and design the collections, some even model in the ad campaigns.) But the demands of a global brand mean translating that history into the present and making it accessible even to those for whom the Trussardi name doesn t inspire equal parts adulation and envy. It s not easy to be a servant of two masters, and the balance was unsteady this time aorund. Gaia imagined a modern man who had one foot in the traditional countryside, where the Trussardi family homestead is, and one in the speeding city. (She called her commuter a superhero, making her one of several Milan designers preoccupied with the notion of heroic multitasking this season.) The aristocratic, country-villa dweller was represented by pleated trousers, cabled sweaters, and camel coats; the urbanite by leather, in a nod to the company s leather-goods heritage, cut into skinny pants, woven jackets, and blazers. Leather parkas bonded to English wool made the two-sided man point literally. But on the whole, the fusion of sleek and sharp with soft and stately jarred more than it jelled.
