Milan: Giles Deacon Re-Imagines a Porcelain Factory, Sees Record Sales

English designer Giles Deacon is on a winning streak. At the invitation of Pitti Immagine, Florence’s interseason fair held during Pitti Uomo in Florence, the English designer installed the Richard Ginori 1735 porcelain factory outside of town to show his Fall pre-collection accessorized with broken plates, bright fright wigs and oversized monkey wrenches. Models worked the conveyor belt. The location was a departure from the usual palazzo that most young designers favor when invited to show at Pitti (just last year Proenza Schouler commissioned a Kembra Pfahler performance of the Voluptuous Horror of Karen Black; the season before that, Thom Browne installed a ballet of male typists). The results of Deacon’s new collaboration with Italian factory Castor have given his collection much more refinement. The clothes look classic and ladylike until you see that the curvy line prints crawling up black trousers and silver lamé dresses are giant paperclips.

Last year Deacon won France’s ANDAM (Association for the Development of Fashion Arts) 160.000€ prize which meant he decamped from London to Paris to show  his spring collection last October (as fellow Brit Gareth Pugh had the year before). Deacon’s talents are no secret to fashion aficionados and his London shows have always been a quirky delight, but that trip to Paris, and despite the fact that his slot on the city’s overcrowded fashion calendar was on the last runway weary day, must have had something to do with the spectacular 43% rise in sales for the season.