Fashion
Sunnei creative directors Loris Messina and Simone Rizzo announce their departure
Published
September 26, 2025
A double surprise at Sunnei. First, a show that wasn’t a show. Then, an unexpected announcement two hours later. In a statement issued on Friday evening, Loris Messina and Simone Rizzo explained that they are leaving their mens- and womenswear ready-to-wear label.
“After ten years, we feel an urgent need to change form, but not direction. We will continue to work in the realm of creativity, with even greater freedom, radicalism and a desire to experiment,” they stated in a brief note.
A few hours earlier, the duo behind Sunnei had taken the liberty of showing no looks at all to a room packed with guests. In place of a traditional runway show, they staged a larger-than-life auction in the middle of fashion week, in collaboration with Christie’s—a thinly veiled denunciation of the commodification of creativity.
Once everyone had taken their seats in what appeared to be an auditorium, with an antique wooden lectern bearing the name Christie’s in large gold letters at centre stage, a voice announced that what was about to unfold was not a fashion show but “an urgent act”. Attendants then handed out what looked like a catalogue listing the lots for sale, complete with descriptions and estimated prices.
The first surprise was that the only two lots presented were two enormous wooden crates. The first lot was described as “a testament to Made in Italy, imbued with creativity and a bold aesthetic”, while the second “is sold as a pair.”
“The work is characterised by a continuous dialogue between digital and physical reality, extending to multidisciplinary projects that blur the boundaries between fashion, design and aesthetic exploration.”
At this point, the models entered the room and took up positions behind two huge balustrades on either side, simulating bidders, phones pressed to their ears, while the auctioneer took his place at the lectern and launched the bidding. The first crate contained the Sunnei brand, founded in 2014 and known for its colourful, relaxed fashion with a highly graphic sensibility. The bidding quickly escalated, and the starting price, set at 6 million “fashion dollars”, soared to 112 million.
The second crate was carefully brought onto the stage by white-gloved movers equipped with electric screwdrivers. When they removed the lid, the two designers appeared—Loris perched on Simone’s shoulders. The starting bid was 17 fashion dollars. The lot went for 95 million to resounding applause. Once the sale was over, the models slipped backstage.
Only Messina and Rizzo could have imagined such a scenario to bid farewell to their brand, carrying their demonstration to its logical conclusion at a time when marketing and storytelling prevail over the product, and a mercantile society dominates. As their statement of intent put it, “Fashion is finance, creativity is for sale.”
“More than ever, today’s industry is driven by hidden but powerful dynamics. This performance is not a direct critique, but a hyperbolic theatrical metaphor for this mechanism. The Sunnei auction is intended as both a disruptive artistic act and a conceptual statement—a visual, contradictory staging of the system, where the symbolic defies the concrete and where desire itself is called into question,” they said.
The image of designers selling themselves to the highest bidder is both telling and apt in the current context, where the big luxury groups appear ever more voracious and omnipresent on the global market, while young designers and small independent labels find it increasingly difficult to survive.
This is not the first time Sunnei has challenged the fashion world. Two years ago, the label invited the public to rate its show. Over the years, its presentations have become cult, each time attracting an audience of connoisseurs, blending immersive experiences with artistic performances.
The two designers were the first to stage a show atop the Pirelli skyscraper, beneath Milan’s ring road repainted white for the occasion, and at the bottom of a drained swimming pool. At times, they had their models sprint in a headlong race, launching them into the crowd in a jubilant, airborne glide. Most recently, they marked Sunnei’s tenth anniversary with an all-senior cast.
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Copyright © 2025 FashionNetwork.com All rights reserved.
Fashion
GoldenTree to buy about $200 million of Saks Global bankruptcy financing, Bloomberg News reports
Published
January 21, 2026
Warped, a proudly Australian menswear brand, made its debut at the recent Pitti Uomo 109, unveiling its first-ever collection for Autumn–Winter 2026/27. Warped channels a strong, functional and authentic masculinity, free of artifice: a man capable of moving with equal ease through the Australian outback or a metropolis, without ever betraying himself. This vision translates into a collection that combines ready-to-wear, streetwear and active-functional pieces, underpinned by rigorous material research, responsible production, and a strong connection to Australia’s history and identity.
The brand is so steeped in the free-spirited, authentic ethos of Mitch “Crocodile” Dundee, a cult figure of 1980s cinema who helped shape the image abroad of the no-nonsense Australian, that even the founder- who arrived in Milan with his two sons, aged 18 and 15, already active in the company- looks like the very character created by Paul Hogan.
“Crocodile Dundee is not just a film to us; it’s a way of being in the world. It’s about a man who hunts crocodiles with his bare hands in the outback and stays true to himself even under the dazzling lights of the metropolis,” Warped founder Jack Cassidy Williams explained to FashionNetwork.com. “It’s the story of a man who enters a sophisticated system without changing who he is. Functional, direct, honest. This is who we are. We’re not here to bend to fashion’s unwritten rules, but to bring our own way of doing things: less artifice, more reality.”
“Everything in the collection is handmade by my family. We design it, select the fabrics, create the patterns, and develop everything together- my children and I- in Australia. Traditional garments with modern finishes, in terms of handle and functionality; we even offer waterproof clothing, such as GOTS-certified waterproof cotton. Then there’s denim. All the fabrics are 100% made in Italy,” Cassidy Williams continues. At the heart of the collection is extensive fabric research: 100% RWS wool; high-stretch scuba fabrics and bi-stretch wool; cotton denim with a 3D weave effect; water-repellent cottons, viscose and viscose/linen blends for suits, jackets and trousers; high-performance, ultra-comfortable fabrics; and kangaroo-leather laces- a material five times as strong as cowhide- hand-finished with raw edges and authentic details.
“The collection is, in a way, a tribute to America, because the theme is the so-called ramblin’ man, or the free man; it’s basically about my whole life,” says the Australian entrepreneur. “All those people who decided to forge their own journey, to walk the path of life without following someone else. Like Hank Williams, Jack Kerouac, Duke Ellington, Bird, Muddy Waters, Pinetop, or Woody Guthrie- men who honoured life. Nowadays it’s so difficult to be free that freedom really is a state of mind. It’s our first collection through and through; we practically finished it before boarding the plane,” Cassidy Williams laughs heartily, then slips on a floppy wide-brimmed hat, slings a kangaroo hide over his shoulder and, as he pretends to crack a whip in the air, looks even more like Mitch Dundee- all after letting us taste a kangaroo salami and crocodile snacks…
“Our family has a textile tradition of great depth- more than sixty years- so Warped also works with the best global manufacturers in the mid-luxury segment: lace from France, fabrics from Italy, and other high-quality materials sourced from factories in Turkey, Japan and Korea,” Jack Cassidy Williams continues. “These factories were chosen not for trend’s sake, but because they’re unique- each one different from the next.”
Warped’s menswear collection for Autumn–Winter 2026/27 comprises around 40 looks spanning ready-to-wear, streetwear, and active-functional pieces. Jackets, suits, trousers, shorts, shirts, and T-shirts sit alongside a street and sportswear offer that includes hoodies, joggers and technical garments, all designed to be comfortable, durable, easy to care for, and genuinely wearable day to day.
Alongside the Warped men’s line, the company presented the Golden Age Sportswear (G.A.S) label in Milan, while the Warped Woman, and G.A.S Woman’s Street collections will debut in Italy from next Spring/Summer.
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Copyright © 2026 FashionNetwork.com All rights reserved.
Published
January 21, 2026
Two indie fashion brands, Auralee from Japan and Études Studio from France, staged highly contrasting collections on Tuesday, the opening day of Paris Fashion Week Men, testifying to the dynamism of the season in the French capital.
Auralee: Purist fashion with polish
A moment of grace on Tuesday evening at Auralee, where Ryota Iwai’s deceptively understated designs never fail to impress.
Staged in the Musée de l’Homme facing an illuminated Eiffel Tower, the show was the latest pure statement by a designer whose clothes blend subtlety with refinement.
Whatever fabric Iwai plays with always seems just right: whether speckled Donegal tweeds seen in brown knit pants for guys, or a frayed hem skirt for girls in this co-ed show. Leather or lambskin jerkins and baseball jackets, all were ideal.
Semi-transparent nylon splash vests or wispy trenches had real cool. While Iwai’s detailing was also very natty- like the flight jacket trimmed with fur.
He is also a great colourist- from the washed-out sea green of a canvas ranger’s jacket to the moody Mediterranean blue of a caban. Though his finale featured a quintet of looks in black. Most charmingly a languid, deconstructed double-breasted cashmere coat worn on a shirtless model- the picture of perfection.
There were perhaps not that many sartorial fireworks in the show, but there didn’t need to be. This was a purist fashion statement of polish and precision that this audience could only admire.
Backed up by a great soundtrack – Sounding Line 6 by Moritz. Von Oswald or the cutely named Autumn Sweater by Yo La Tengo- the whole display won Ryota a loud and long ovation. Fully deserved too.
Études Studio: Resonating in IRCAM
Études Studio certainly know how to stage a show. The design duo invited guests into the bowels of the Institute for Research and Coordination in Acoustics/Music, or IRCAM a unique French concept dedicated to experimental sounds.
Which we enjoyed a lot of thanks to Darren J. Cunningham, a British electronic musician known professionally as Actress. It made for a dramatic mood, as keys and chords swelled and raged throughout this show.
As a result, the design duo of Aurélien Arbet and Jérémie Egry titled this Autumn/Winter 2027 collection ‘Résonances.’ Terming it in their program: “A medley bringing into dialogue the minimalist experiments rooted in John Cage’s philosophy with the emergence of intelligent Dance Music in the early 1990s.”
The result was a rather moody series of clothes, made in a sombre palette of muddy brown, dark purple, black, black, and even more black.
What stood out were the bulbous, off-the-shoulder puffers, worn over corduroy shirts or roll-necks- topped by some great rancher hats courtesy of Lambert. One could also admire sleek raingear; cool cocoon shaped jerkins and fuzzy mohair sweaters. And appreciate a sleek A-Line coat and zippered knit safari jacket in a rare women’s look in this show.
Photoshopped faces in black and white scarves all looked very appealing, as did the brand’s debut bag, a satchel in tough canvas. And one had to applaud one great dull gold, wildly deconstructed puffer.
That said, the collection lacked proper kick and rarely resonated as the show title suggested it would. A decent statement about the mode, but far from a fashion moment.
Copyright © 2026 FashionNetwork.com All rights reserved.
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