Emanuel Ungaro Collections

Emanuel Ungaro
By Nicole Phelps

A year and a half into his tenure at Emanuel Ungaro, Fausto Puglisi is picking up on the challenges of brand revivals. "The risk of looking too closely at the archives," he said today, "is that the clothes don't look down-to-earth enough for a real girl." The trick, he knows, is hitting a woman where she lives, and Puglisi has an increasingly good handle on that, as evinced by pieces like short A-line cocktail dresses and flowing maxi dresses in zebra stripes and micro-florals, respectively. Also spot-on: loose-fit jeans worn with an embellished bra top and a printed blazer slightly eighties-ish in its proportions. A sweatshirt printed with the likeness of Madame du Barry (Marie Antoinette's arch rival) and the word Wyoming, on the other hand, was a bit of a stretch, not to mention a little tired, even if we appreciated Puglisi's reasoning: "It represents freedom." It was the exception to the rule here. Other things we liked: a versatile and sexy jersey dress that draped a multitude of ways from an elastic band on the inner waist, and a long printed dress gathered and draped at the hip with a small ruffle that Ungaro himself would recognize. Maybe the archives aren't the enemy after all.

Emanuel Ungaro

Pre Spring 2015 collection

Emanuel Ungaro
By Nicole Phelps

At its height in the eighties, the house of Emanuel Ungaro was synonymous with exuberant prints and ultra-feminine silhouettes. Today the label's new designer, Fausto Puglisi, opted to explore one of the less-remembered parts of Ungaro's oeuvre: androgyny. "What I used to like most were his masculine suits in all those prints," Puglisi said backstage. There's nothing wrong with going against the grain. Brand revivals don't have to pay obeisance to the founder's legacy to be successful these days: See the upward trajectory of Hedi Slimane's Saint Laurent.

In any case, with their easy attitude, the suits Puglisi opened with were two of the show's strongest pieces—one herringbone, the other in royal blue with "broken" black roses. Other highlights included a black-and-white jacquard sweater tucked into slightly oversize printed black trousers, and a couple of neatly constructed short-sleeve dresses with a fifties flare to the skirts. But the collection did have some problems. At times, Puglisi's innate tendency toward excess resulted in heavy-handed fabric combinations. On other looks, there was a preponderance of embellishments. If Puglisi can find ways to continue to simplify, he'll have better luck next time.

Fall 2014 Ready-to-Wear

Emanuel Ungaro

By Maya Singer

Last season, the collection that Fausto Puglisi sent down the Emanuel Ungaro runway was a coquettish, frou-filled affair. This time out, the buzzy Puglisi opted for a grown-up tone and much more urbane silhouettes. Hemlines erred long, baggy trousers had a masculine toughness, and elsewhere the emphasis was on sharp, kimono-inspired shapes. But all those elements really just served to underline Puglisi's graphic theme, which did link this collection back to Spring's. Puglisi continued to show off his knack for juxtaposing patterns—his way of mixing zebra stripe, herringbone, and chevron was particularly playful and compelling—and for elaborating them in interesting ways. Many of his animal prints, for instance, were developed to look like they'd been inked in the style of antique Chinese illustrations. That was a nice touch—it introduced a suggestion of softness that was missing from this largely astringent outing, what with its focus on a black-and-white palette cut with bright orange and lime green. The textural variety helped, as well; the squishy knit wool used in a long, fitted T-shirt dress and the mink chevron-stripe on a coat and along the front of a wool herringbone skirt looked good. Not everything here worked—a lot of the asymmetric pieces came off rather mannered—but in general Puglisi's choice to pare back served him well.

Pre Fall 2014 collection