MILAN (Reuters) – Italy’s Blumarine brought a mix of snakeskin and neon cycling shorts to its Milan fashion week catwalk show on Friday, combining sportswear with more elegant looks.
Like many other fashion brands, Blumarine, known for delicate and feminine designs, shifted to more casual and comfortable clothes and made use of plenty of snakeskin leather in the spring-summer 2019 collection.
Parading in the cloister of the city’s State Archives, a seventeenth century building in the heart of the Italian fashion capital, the majority of the creations of designer Anna Molinari, juxtaposed tight-fitting lycra shorts in fluorescent purple, orange, pink and green and orange with sleeveless pleated cardigans, jeans and sheer dresses.
Flowing snakeskin print dresses were worn with cycling shorts or chunky yellow sneakers and a long knitted cardigan was matched with purple gym kit.
One model displayed bright orange satin cargo trousers paired with a fluorescent blue sports bra, a key-chain dangling from her neck. The looks were completed with flat or kitten-heeled pointed shoes in vivid colors.
Denim made a brief appearance on the runway, with an oversized distressed jeans jacket worn over a floral patterned lycra onepiece, and ripped jeans were paired with a neon orange men’s coat, with brightly colored matching bra and leggings underneath.
Flowers, used in the past by Blumarine, made an appearance in just a couple of looks at the end of the show, displayed on satin shorts, draped skirts and transparent tops.
The show closed with a model wearing violet lycra shorts paired with a purple metallic sequined dress and a fringed pink metallic cape.
Milan’s fashion extravaganza, with Italy’s biggest names showcasing their spring-summer collections for 2019, will run until Monday.
Reporting by Giulia Segreti, editing by Louise Heavens