If only I’d packed a pair of earplugs for Alberta Ferretti things might have gone along a different route. The set was charming, the scarlet rays of a setting sun glowed through trees in a moving projection on the back wall and the atmosphere was equally pleasant as the fading light of the first day of Milan Fashion Week swept down the walls of the courtyard around the tent.
The clothes were aptly melancholy and romantic; high necks, soft velvet boots and heavily embroidered tapestry called to mind a troupe of lost Russian prairie girls. And the soundtrack? An orchestral version of Every Breath You Take by Sting. I know. While a dodgy soundtrack might seem irrelevant, it absolutely isn’t – here was a collection that was beautifully made and incredibly luxurious but lacking any real connection to the outside world. What worked best were unusual updates; a cropped white billowing tunic which sat somewhere between Tudor undershirt and seventies Malibu flower power was equal measures prim and undone, though a little lost among the heaviness elsewhere. While this was a collection which championed all things moody, gloomy and beautiful it could certainly have benefitted from a bold stroke of modernity. And a different soundtrack. Alberta, fire your DJ.