Mr Viral
This season, Camille Miceli brought Pucci’s la dolce vita tour to Portofino, staging a takeover of La Cervara, a medieval hilltop abbey with hidden cloisters, manicured gardens, and sweeping views of the Golfo del Tigullio. Guests were treated to an intimate show en plein air, the rather breathtaking backdrop at sunset creating a languid, warm, and lighthearted vibe. Miceli has a knack for French-Italian cool.
Pucci visuals, often overwhelmingly dense, are getting a fresh, kinetic spin under Miceli. For spring, she zeroed in on the Marmo motif, “the first print that seduced me,” she said. Originally conceived by Emilio Pucci when he found himself mesmerized by the sunlit ripples inside Capri’s Grotta Azzurra, the swirling pattern carries a hypnotic, almost hallucinatory rhythm. Miceli wove it through the collection—reimagined in prints; picked out with metallic studs on tunics and palazzo pants; and transformed into beaded black-and-white swirls, glossy as seashells.
Miceli experimented with volume and silhouette, taking a more self-assured approach to technique and savoir-faire. Breezy, cloud-like tops, “as if billowed by the wind,” met bouffant crinolines crafted from parachute nylon, cinched and shaped with plays of drawstrings and embroidered with curly 3D appliqués. Flowing caftans contrasted with tight-fitting asymmetrical tunics, bandeau miniskirts were paired with oversized masculine shirts, and sheer second-skin stretch-net tube dresses clung to the body like tatouages. Emphasizing motion and dash, printed tubular fringes were a decorative leitmotif—rippling from belted ponchos, cascading off-shoulder on tops and skirts, and swaying dramatically from a square-cut, black-and-white beaded gown worn by Kristen McMenamy, who closed the show together with Naomi Campbell, sensational in a sinuous black-and-white sequined number.
Miceli dialed down Pucci’s typically exuberant, riotous palette to a restrained trio of black, white, and soft-shell pink. Yet the house’s energy remained intact—only more crisply outlined and intentionally focused. “Reality is so harsh—I think we need softness, tenderness, not aggression,” she remarked. If only the world were taking notes.
