Ready for the Rains

CEBU, Philippines — Even before summer could begin, Fendi had been all ready for the rains. On the final day of Milan Autumn/Winter 2018 men’s show, back in January yet, Silvia Fendi went mad for monograms, actually did umbrella hats and turned their show space into an airport. It was not actually rainwear, though, but actually more about travel gear.

There was a variety of vintage Fendi cases, Fendi-stickered boxes and even, a monogrammed pram, as Silvia Fendi unpacked and repacked more than just her house’s signature luggage. “We wanted to return to the Fendi roots,” she explained backstage, “to explore the Fendi identity.” From the FF logo to Pequin stripes, the Fendi stamp to the Fendi yellow, the collection had every strong house signature alongside a sprinkling of Silvia Venturini Fendi’s own.

The family’s first store was opened by her grandparents on Rome’s Via del Plebiscito in 1925. “Luggage, trunks, umbrellas,” Sylvia Fendi read the sign on a photograph. Umbrellas! Yes, umbrellas was very much a part of the original Fendi items.

And what do people associate more with umbrellas? Rain, of course!

“It’s about returning to these items and seeing what’s changed in almost one hundred years,” Sylvia Fendi continued. So what did she think had changed and what did they look like now? Well, perhaps after losing one-too-many standard umbrellas herself, Fendi turned them into headwear.