The defocused silhouettes of bamboo palms shifting lightly in the breeze were screened around the walls of Giorgio Armani’s marble-effect runway this morning. Exotic birdsong fluted through the cavernous main theater space in the designer’s beautifully maintained Tadao Ando fashion cathedral. Leaning back in our padded beige director’s chairs, the experience felt as close as a Monday morning work appointment will ever get to a vacay afternoon spent dozing in some Arcadian subtropical beachside cabana.
The clothes were just as serenely soothing to contemplate, a 92-look saunter through variations of the Armani silhouette in slowly shifting tonal stages that progressed through gray, beige, taupe, cream, carbon, bronze, and navy, to a final inky twilight blue. Highlights included tie-accessorized cotton double-breasted suiting in silvery gray whose precise slouch and softness reconciled Monday morning context and ease-imbued energy. Neck scarves added jauntiness to silky-sheened collarless work jackets arranged over full pleated pants and covered-lace suede derby shoes. A suede blouson/bomber in taupe/bamboo with floating button closures worn over a rib knit sweater tucked into some suspender-suspended five-pleat pants dreamily recalled some of Armani’s very earliest 1970s menswear collections.
A series of monochrome negative prints of palm trees and leaves was printed on loose T-shirts, shirts and pants. Next came a quartet of frond-printed technical silk looks in matte metallic tones whose full pants tucked into sometimes squeaky-soled boots transmitted a leisured yet utilitarian demeanor. Later we saw more palm leaves in knit jacquard and a colored-in outline print. The sun slowly set on this last Giorgio Armani menswear show of his ninth decade with a brace of perfectly proportioned collarless wrapped evening jackets and pants in a blue so dark it almost seemed as black as the woven leather tassel-topped loafers below them. Mr. Armani took his bow flanked by Leo Dell’Orco (who had also shared the bow at Emporio) and Gianluca Dell’Orco, who is head of the Giorgio Armani men’s style office.
