Dream weaver
“Never.” Pierpaolo Piccioli is weighing in on whether an haute couture idea is ever abandoned for being too difficult. “It is never too much. Here, it was the idea of embroidering, not on the dress but so it was floating around the dress so it’s like a dream, almost 3D. It moves,” he says pulling a sprig of silver, atop which sits a tiny rose-coloured flower. The gown in front of him jangles in response. The delicate floret is one of hundreds springing from a look that is part of a couture collection he is showing in Beijing the next day. En masse , they complete the jaw-dropping effect of blurring the silhouette. Like a cloud of flowers.
“Do you like it?” he asks, posing a question that seems too feeble for such a design feat. Limits aren’t in the Valentino creative director’s vocabulary, a fact underscored by each gown hanging around the nondescript room where a makeshift atelier, including 45 workers, has been transplanted from Piazza Mignanelli in Rome to the Sanlitun shopping district. Final alterations are being made to
