Wild Wild Prada: Fashion as one of the Basic Instincts

There is, undoubtedly, a certain irony in this statement as the fashion that Miuccia Prada and Raf Simons create is a complex and exclusively cultural product, crafted from a wide variety of connotations associated with both everyday culture and its high-endversion. The FW2025 men's collection is no exception. However, when Prada claims that their new men's collection “shows unbroken instincts”, it might be because they believe that basic instincts are not simple constructs either.

In any case, it is always an incredibly exciting activity to unravel this intricate web of associations, allusions, and connotations that Miuccia Prada and Raf Simons weave each time, even if many of them are already familiar to us.

It all started, of course, with the scaffolding that filled the Deposito space in Fondazione Prada, where Prada shows are traditionally held – and this rather unconventional set design made quite an impression as well as the flagship store Calvin Klein 205W39NYC on Madison Avenue when Simons worked as a creative director for the brand, where the same scaffolding filled the interior space with mannequins sitting on its platforms. Everyone reminisced about the famous Berlin techno cub, Berghain (it’s a well-known fact that Simons is a big fan of techno), but other locations that come to mind include the setting for the Miu Miu 2015 cruise show, as well as the flagship store Calvin Klein 205W39NYC on Madison Avenue when Simons worked as a creative director for the brand, where the same scaffolding filled the interior space with mannequins sitting on its platforms. Here, as in many other aspects, the tastes of Prada and Simons converge.

The most notable material in this collection was shearling, featured in collars, hood trims, full fur tops (which, naturally, are the primary items that fall into the category of basic instincts), and sheepskin coats. However, the main thing was not its presence as such but the items that accompanied it, such as cowboy boots crafted from bright vinyl leather or fabric printed withcheerful flowers, pajamas (some of which, upon closer inspection, were made of thin white leather), flannel dressing gowns, and crumpled trousers, adorned with pen strokes, falling somewhere between pajama pants and jeans. All these were layered in the most unexpected combinations, such as striped pajama pants, a shearling top, and a rather classical straight gray gabardine coat on top. The sheepskin coat was paired with a light soft blue cotton jacket with a zipper, formal black trousers, and white Mary Jane shoes. Vintage-looking flowers were pinned to the fur-collared bombers, blazers, and coats, reminiscent of what the signore milanesi wore in the 1970s. The jeans were paired with short, tight flower-patterned T-shirts that resembled children's knitwear – as if the boy had grown, but the T-shirt remained the same.

All these techniques – scaling children's, doll, and women's clothing, combining deliberately home apparel with deliberately streetwear, pairing strictly formal pieces with the most relaxed ones, and more – are familiar to us, and we remember them well. However, it’s impressive how brilliantly and wittily they utilize these techniques and consistently create new harmony from them each time!

And let’s discuss the meanings that set great designers apart from their epigones. One of the key themes for Prada has always been protection and shelter provided by clothing. Clothes shield us from the external world, which isn’t always comfortable, offering a sense of a safety place, or at least creating its illusion. Today, this timeless aspect of Miuccia Prada's work is more relevant than ever in our uncertain world, where some days, getting out of bed, getting dressed, and going outside can be daunting. Miuccia Prada and Raf Simons suggest simply pulling a sheepskin coat over pajamas or a fur hood over a dressing gown to achieve anexceptionally elegant and contemporary look. In doing so, they act as true humanists.

Courtesy: Prada

Text: Editorial team