Milan Fashion Week 2025: Gucci’s team effort amid change, Prada’s ‘raw glamour’, Fendi’s 100th anniversary, Marni’s wild creativity and Max Mara’s literary homage

Feb 28 , 2025

The Prada autumn/winter 2025 show had an undone quality to it, what co-creative directors Miuccia Prada and Raf Simons referred to as “raw glamour”. Photo: EPA-EFE

Gucci offers a ‘foundational’ collection as it awaits a new creative director, while Marni’s Francesco Risso wows with creative collaborations; Fendi’s family affair meanwhile hits it out of the park

Milan Fashion Week, currently under way, got off to a slow start with a transitional show from mega brand Gucci. But things picked up later in the week with a celebratory event from Fendi – which marks its 100th anniversary this year – the always agenda-setting Prada show, and an ode to artistic freedom from Marni’s Francesco Risso.

Named The Pink Sun, the Marni show was the result of a month-long artist residency that saw Risso work with London-based artists Olaolu Slawn and Soldier Boyfriend in a shared studio, mixing historical influences with the energy of underground culture, according to the show notes.

Here are more highlights from a week of back-to-back shows and presentations from the capital of Italian fashion.

Unfettered creativity at Marni’s autumn/winter 2025 show. Photo: Handout

Gucci, Italy’s largest luxury brand, accounts for the lion’s share of parent company Kering’s revenues, which is why the turnaround of the label has been a key concern for the luxury behemoth.

Earlier this month, Gucci parted ways with creative director Sabato De Sarno, who was dismissed barely two years into his tenure. Sales were down 24 per cent in the last quarter of 2024, and the brand is now under pressure to get it right, with the appointment of a creative leader who can reignite desirability and lift sales.

A look from Gucci’s autumn/winter 2025 collection, which was designed by the studio team. Photo: Reuters

Given the situation, it wouldn’t be fair to be too harsh towards the design team who worked on the autumn/winter 2025 range. While the collection was a bit derivative (the menswear especially had hints of Prada), it was a sensible effort during a time of transition. Gucci referred to this collection as “foundational” and “a continuum of craft, taste and culture”.

It seems that the powers that be felt it made sense to go back to basics before a new creative director takes over and – hopefully – manages to ignite the comeback everyone in the industry is rooting for.

Gucci presented its womenswear and menswear collections at the same show this season. Photo: Reuters