Fendi Turns to a 1970s Pop Icon, and Emilia-Romagna's Knitwear Belt Takes Note

Maria Grazia Chiuri's Fendi collection, shown in Milan this week, put the 1970s Italian pop star Raffaella Carrà at the centre of the runway, according to the Guardian, which described a show of diaphanous dresses and visible bras celebrating an "incredible feminist" of the decade. The Guardian reported that Chiuri, who returned from Paris to her native Rome to work at the Roman house, said she has "less of a uniform these days".

Carrà, who died in 2021, was born in Bellaria-Igea Marina on the Adriatic coast of Emilia-Romagna, and her career as a singer, dancer and television presenter made her a household name in Italy and across Latin America. The Guardian framed the Fendi tribute as a reading of 1970s Italian pop culture through a contemporary wardrobe rather than a retrospective.

For Emilia-Romagna, the runway matters less as spectacle than as a demand signal. The region's textile and knitwear workshops, concentrated along the Via Emilia and in the Carpi and Modena districts, supply finished garments and components to Italian houses, and the Milan shows set the orders that carry those workshops through the following season.