A Nirvana-logo T-shirt and a burning desire to change the system. This is how Gabriele (Bebe) Moratti, co-founder and creative director of Redemption, introduces himself as he discusses the new chapter of his fashion label, rebuilt from scratch after weathering the shockwave of Covid. FashionNetwork.com met the entrepreneur and designer in Milan. Born in 1978, Moratti has dressed stars such as Madonna and Lady Gaga, and now lives in the countryside, in ‘his’ San Patrignano, far from the spotlight and the suffocating pace of contemporary society.

“Sales are doing well thanks to e-commerce. Even the boutiques are increasing season by season,” said Moratti, son of Gianmarco and Letizia Moratti. The designer is a keen film aficionado and is fresh from a Silver Lion in Venice. Six months before the pandemic, Moratti had opened a flagship store in New York designed by his friend, director Luca Guadagnino (whose film ‘Bones and All’ he produced through his production company Memo Films).

“Covid wiped out everything- the shop and around 140 multi-brand retailers around the world, across the US, France, the UK, Italy and Germany. American buyers were absent from Europe for two years. Rebuilding this network will not be easy. They’ll come back and ask us for pre-collections, but I no longer do them. I used to live in my office designing six collections a year. Today I’m down to two. My goal is to remain much more niche. With the latest season, we’ve reached around twenty stores,” said Moratti.

Turning adversity into opportunity, Bebe Moratti used the aftermath of Covid to sharpen the priorities of his company, founded more than ten years ago with two childhood friends, Daniele Sirtori and Vanni Laghi, whom he met in the San Patrignano rehabilitation community. “Fashion is becoming homogenised and is only focused on quarter-on-quarter growth. I have a background in banking- a Darwinian paradigm that leaves too many things behind. Let’s put ourselves back at the centre,” said Moratti.

The model embraced by Redemption starts with rejecting trends and moves in the opposite direction to fast fashion. “If you’re wearing one of my dresses from seven years ago, that’s one less unnecessary item I’ve sold. It’s a great satisfaction,” said Moratti. This reduction-led approach runs through his entire philosophy. “Producing four collections a year destroys you. That’s why there are no emerging brands any more, and today fashion week is living off the glory of its golden years. ‘We stand on the shoulders of giants’, but we can become giants too if we go back to making things on a human scale,” said the designer.

Moratti calls for a return to origins and to the authenticity that led him to create Redemption. “When we started we were true outsiders. I never studied fashion. I started designing because I enjoyed it, not to chase a goal. My goal is to wake up in the morning and be happy with what I do. If you do something with passion, good things happen. And they happen for others, too, because Redemption is always at the forefront of charitable causes,” said Moratti.

Commitment to social causes is in the brand’s DNA. “I founded Redemption to redeem myself. We are all imperfect and we make mistakes every day. One of our founders, who left us three years ago, spent 40 years in the San Patrignano community helping others. He exemplifies a life of excess later devoted to serving others. Redemption was founded with the intention of being engaged. We will make our contribution to the Palestinian cause,” assured the entrepreneur.

The brand is a vehicle for a deep sense of responsibility that Moratti aligns with his work as an entrepreneur. “In my own small way, I can choose to build a company that is socially engaged and gives back part of its profits to charity. I trained in the archives of the Como fabric mills and with a former Ferré pattern cutter. Many consultants warn me that there are no margins in Made in Italy. But for me it is an added value. I only design what I believe in,” Moratti continues.

Thus, the Redemption woman becomes a manifesto of the brand’s principles. “She has a rock-star attitude and believes in herself to the point of taking to the stage and championing nonconformist ideas. She is inspired by artists who fought to change society. She takes to the stage when she talks to others, when she voices an opinion that goes against the grain, when she is at work or wants to be noticed. My uniforms are armour to help her face the world like a rock star,” said Moratti.

Redemption’s signature colours and silhouettes return in the upcoming summer collection. “White, black, red and the brand’s signature pink, which blooms everywhere and brings beauty amid the rocks.” And while the early proposals always stemmed from a musical genre, in the post-Covid period the archive has become the designer’s primary source of inspiration. “We have done so much over the years. Today I start from our mood boards. I retrieve ideas from the past, put them on the mannequin, work on them, stitch them, pin them, redesign them. I don’t want to be obsessed with always doing something different. I’ve learnt to say no,” concluded Gabriele Moratti.