By Erin Moonyeen Haley
It’s tempting to say that Valentino’s 2022-2023 Pink PP Collection is Barbiecore-inspired.
With Margot Robbie set to prance and preen across the screen with delightful plasticity in Greta Gerwig’s visionary film next year, looks heading into the Fall have been absolutely saturated with every shade of pink, from pure bubblegum, taffy and fuchsia to hues that inspire food-court-style cravings for cotton candy and confectionaries.
While the line's debut roughly coincides with the arrival of Gerwig’s movie, Valentino’s Creative Director Pierpaolo Piccioli concocted the monochrome collection in a radical frame of mind. Working in collaboration with the Pantone Color Institute, Piccioli's mantra was to simplify the color selections in order to draw the eye to the clothing’s contouring and architecture.
Amidst the bursts of brilliance, it takes little effort to admire the sculpted necklines, crepe couture dresses, oversized blazers, gauzy bodices and pink tulle skirts. (Think Florence Pugh at the Fall/Winter 2022 Haute Couture show in Rome.)
Men have hardly been left out, with nylon sweatshirts and Nappa leather low-top sneakers also coming in a color that is as bright as a highlighter. With neutral shades dominating the runways throughout the 2010s, Piccioli’s partnership with Pantone Color Institute reflects the fact that Pink PP has been newly inaugurated in the Pantone color palette.
Piccioli has emphasized that he sees pink as a symbolic color, reflecting the fact that a world that is all too often depicted in homogeneous safety can still surprise with bright, unexpected outbursts. He developed this optimistic philosophy while reading about Lucio Fontana, the Argentine-Italian artist known for Spatial Concept, Waiting, a series of canvases that were cut up and known as Tagli (‘cuts’).
With the cuts of the canvas, Fontana was able to play around with bright colors for the purpose of arresting attention, an artistic thesis that Piccioli has experimented with in turn, fusing creation with the idea of simplicity.
It is in this creative embrace of color that Piccioli has ensured that the coming months will be bright and arresting, pink enough to ward off the gray chills of winter.
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