SPECIAL PRADA BY BLOMMERS & SCHUMM + JAMES VALERI 

MIUCCIA PRADA : “There is the notion in fashion that only glamour is important, I hate that, I have always fought against that. This collection is about finding beauty everywhere, beauty of different kinds. We looked at uniforms that represent care, like nurses, because the act of caring is a beautiful thing. We wanted to transform these uniforms of caring into uniforms of beauty.’ ‘Reality is rich. Real life is much more rich than any fantasy. And therefore more important. For me, the real meaning of what we do is to bring importance to the everyday. Everyday life deserves beautiful things. Because every day of life counts.”

“We always talk about reality, and we, as designers, are very aware of what is happening, the problems, the difficulties. It is a complicated moment in the world — and we react to it. The most honest thing we can do is to create something useful for people today - to face reality in, and frame the idea of our reality through clothes. We want to create fashion with a significance and a meaning — that is the value of fashion today.”

RAF SIMONS : “This collection is inspired by the idea of beauty. But each time, when Miuccia and I take a topic, we try to break out of its typical approach. The idea of beauty we were drawn to was synonymous with the idea of caring, the idea of taking care, and the uniforms associated with that. Because people that care are the most important. It always comes back to people. It’s about responsibility.” — “These typical uniform garments, connected to the everyday world, are usually seen as minor. Unconsidered. So for this collection we liked the idea of considering them, celebrating them. We can give them an importance - because those garments are important, the wearers are important, the action is important. Their lives. There is also the opposite — we take pieces from a special occasion, or created for one day like a wedding gown, and here it becomes everyday. Why should this celebration of love be for only a single day?”

“This collection is about archetypal clothing, about taking the recognizable but changing it through silhouette and cut - their form language is transformed. It is also about the DNA of Prada, clothes embedded with fragments of an identity we can recognize as fundamentally Prada. These are unmistakable and significant gestures, towards the heritage and history of the brand, and to the meaning of Prada now.”