Alessandro Michele showcases all things bright and beautiful with a luxury mankini and a live cockatoo the stars of Gucci’s debut Paris Fashion Week showcase

Gucci designer Alessandro Michele trades in theatrics. When he unveiled his Spring/Summer 2019 collection of Lady Di jackets, sequin palazzo pants and marabou trimmed evening gowns in Paris’s Theatre Le Palace last night, there was a sense that he had a found his spiritual home.

At least, Italian fashion's front man had found his home from home with the French capital and not the house’s Milan head office serving as the backdrop for his latest collection.

In what was the first fashion show to take place inside the theatre - and Gucci’s first mainline ready to wear collection ever to be unveiled outside of Italy - the great and good of the fashion industry were offered viewing binoculars before squeezing into red velvet seats.

Among them was Faye Dunaway, Amanda Lear and Jane Birkin who arose mid-performance to serenade the crowd.

The show served as the closing instalment in a three part trilogy in which Michele sought to celebrate France.

It follows an ad campaign, unveiled in January, which remembered the 1969 protests in Paris and a resort showcase which was staged in Arles in June.

If a love of France inspired the location for this fashion mise en scene, a passion for the radical was its beating heart with Michele looking to the Italian experimental theatre duo Leo de Berardinis and Perla Peragallo for inspiration.

Citing the ‘theatre of contradiction” in his collection notes, Michele welcomed a cast of misfits to the stage. Sporting wearable contradictions and outfits which were a melting pot of uncountable ideas and fragmented references points, a cast of male and female models hosted everything from sailor dresses to sequin trousers to crumpled tweed body warmers. The boundaries between gender, time and creative influence remained blurred throughout with Gucci continuing in its mission to rewrite the fashion rule book.

Michele’s Gucci aesthetic is fancy-dress-box fashion recast in luxury form and this collection showed a designer very much in his comfort zone with exquisite tailoring and a faultless attention to detail serving as moments of calm among the madness.

Intentionally chaotic, there was plenty to raise smiles including a Gucci take on the ‘mankini’ - showcased alongside tweed pair of shorts - and model who took to the catwalk with a live cockatoo resting peacefully on her shoulder.

This breed of Gucci is not for wallflowers and accordingly, there was little in the way of basics on offer. Instead, bountiful accessories will appeal to those who want to dip a toe into the signature aesthetic without wearing it from head to toe.

Chunky soled trainers and a revised version of its best selling court shoe are set to insight retail mania among luxury consumers who have ensured Gucci’s accessory offering a position as one of the most in demand around.

A series of Janis Joplin style felt hats in shades of vibrant fuchsia and tangerine are among the items poised to ignite mania among Gucci superfans - many of whom lined the pavements outside the Theatre Le Palace with the hope of catching a glimpse of the man they consider a god among designers.