The two designers sent 126 Haute Couture dresses to the catwalk in a unique setting, and they give visitors the possibility, until 15 September, to access for the first time the internal cell of the Temple of Concord, usually forbidden to pass.
I think that the Alta Moda show at the temple in Agrigento was about the idea of Olympus and its goddesses. Tonight it is the turn of the gods.” So said Domenico Dolce at a preview of yesterday evening’s Alta Sartoria menswear show, the closing act in this summer’s Sicilian trilogy of Alta events.
Fresh from the wonders of ancient Rome and the Fendi show, the splendors of Magna Graecia beckoned with the Dolce & Gabbana Alta Moda collection, staged in the Valley of the Temples in the shadow of the Sicilian town of Agrigento.
Staged in the handsomely battered courtyard of the town hall of Sciacca (a space that appeared to have been struck by its fair share of lightning bolts over the aeons), this show was a continued consideration of a more than 2,000-year-old act of cultural contamination. “The Alta Moda is the best of the best,” said Domenico Dolce backstage before the show as he explained the intricacies of technique that had been harnessed to each creation. “That’s a given, but more than that, it is amore. Everything comes from the heart, and the Alta Moda and the Alta Sartoria (Dolce and Stefano Gabbana’s luxurious, bespoke menswear line) are the ultimate expressions of that.”
Last night, this key moment in the globalisation of the ancient world was held up as a mirror of the present to an audience of clients—many multimillionaires from the United States, Hong Kong, Russia, Taiwan, India, Brazil, and beyond—who have become as rich as Croesus, thanks to current globalisation.
In this ad hoc amphitheater scattered with oversized masculine statues in plaster of paris, all tumultuous sagas of beard and epically rock-hard abs, we were first presented with a trio of divine masculinity as it used to be: Zeus (Noah Mills) Hercules (Adam Senn) and Apollo (Evandro Soldati) in flowing fresco hemmed white robes and golden sandals with golden archery equipment as a sportif accessory. That love was literally expressed with a cupid dress complete with a quiver and golden arrows, but more generally in the amazing workmanship lavished on these exuberant clothes. I love them, and how they love the importance they give to their beautiful land… Sicily.
Article edited by Sarah Duque Lovisoni