298 SEPTEMBER 2019 VOGUE.COM
stately turn-of-the-century building
in his native Milan. It was here that
he photographed his look book and
presented the debut fall 2019 Zanini
collection to a hand-picked group of
press and buyers. The pieces have the
subtle flavor of well-loved vintage finds
and focus on exquisite fabrics—
a jet-beaded shift dress with a flapper
feel, for instance; a wool greatcoat
lined in Taroni’s washed gazar; a
billowing duchesse satin dress faced in
featherlight chiffon from Lyon’s Sfate
et Combier; or pajama pants in a bark-
textured Japanese kimono silk sourced
on one of Zanini’s trips to the country
he loves (and which he documented
in a series of quirky photographs that
provided much of the inspiration for
the collection).
“I had two things in mind,” Zanini
says. “A specific customer—a woman who is very at ease with
herself, but who doesn’t want to show off—and specific buyers.”
He invited buyers from 10 specialty stores from Tokyo to the
Hamptons—with Dover Street Market, Ikram, and Tiina among
them—and, gratifyingly, each of them placed orders (some of
them, Zanini notes, even matching specific clients to individual
pieces). “Seeing that they liked the collection assured me that if
you have a clear idea in your mind and remain authentic, you can
hit the target—even if the mission seems impossible at first! It’s
very empowering.”
Zanini’s home reflects his subtle design aesthetic, with its
honest midcentury wood furniture, a Svenskt Tenn sofa in a
patchwork of cotton velvets, and carpets by the Swedish designer
Märta Måås-Fjetterström that pay homage to childhood
holidays spent playing in the country’s island archipelago.
A jagged black laminate–and–glass coffee table designed by
Robert Mapplethorpe in the early
1980s adds edge, and on the walls
Zanini has hung Mapplethorpe’s
photographs and artworks
alongside contemporary images
and pictures by artists including
Wolfgang Tillmans, Sanya
Kantarovsky, Mathew Weir, Roy
Oxlade, and Paul P.
“It’s lovely to have some quality
time with people,” Zanini says of
his open-house presentation, “and to not have the pressure
of digesting a humongous collection.” (After his decades in
the industry, Zanini is keenly aware of the waste and surplus
in much of the unsustainable fashion system, and his tightly
edited offering is partially a response to that.) “The buyers
love that, too,” he says, “because they are so used to drowning
in showrooms with thousands of SKUs and samples—and
I feel the fatigue of too many collections, too many runway
shows, too many Instagram feeds—too much of everything.
I think that people are looking for something that is not so
overexposed.” Zanini discovered that he had to persuade the
suppliers and manufacturers
to accept his modest orders—
“It was like flirting,” he jokes.
“The first collection was like
a blind date.”
With this in mind, Zanini
decided not to embrace
e-commerce for his debut,
relishing instead the idea of
growing “a loyal clientele
season after season through
word of mouth. I still believe
that fashion gravitates
around desire,” he says, “and
there is nothing sexy with
being overwhelmed by stuff
all the time.”
Though Zanini admits that
when one works for a global
brand, “everything is easier
because you can delegate,”
he doesn’t regret “the insane,
strangling, killer pressure.
I’ve been part of a certain game of musical chairs,” he notes
wryly, “and I’ve seen designers—myself and others—come and
go and too quickly.”
Zanini, who has worked in New York and Paris, now relishes
his life back in Milan, a city that represents for him “a certain
kind of understatement, a discreet luxury—if you like the idea
of what’s behind closed doors, Milan can tickle that fantasy. But
although I like to think that Milan’s changed,” he adds, talking
of the recent explosion of maverick young talent in all design
fields, “I’ve always loved it. Even when it was gloomy, Milan was
a city of giants,” he says, ticking off the iconic names of Italian
fashion. “It was their kingdom—understandably so—but a new
generation needs to emerge. We need to let our voice be heard. To
raise your voice in your own way—even whispering—is already
something.”—hamish bowles
HOME IS WHERE THE STYLE IS
THE DESIGNER NOT ONLY SHOWED HIS DEBUT ZANINI COLLECTION
AT HIS NEO-SCANDI MILANESE HOME—HE WAS ALSO INSPIRED BY IT.
“I think that people
are look ing for
something that is
not so overexposed,”
Zanini says
VLIFE
NACHO ALEGRE,
VOGUE,
2017
