Sometimes, in fashion reportage, there can be an inclination to apply meaning where perhaps there is none to be found—that search for the cerebral, a designer’s intention. During the post-show run-through in a private gallery space on Via Spartaco on Friday, Prada Press explained that the approach that Miuccia Prada and Raf Simons took was about trial and error; they opted for the incidental over the intentional.

Prada acolytes, however, may see the references to previous collections (yes, there were the different shoes that drew reference to the “aughts”, anecdotal colours and some familiar embellishment techniques in the beading). The influence of Simons’ own back catalogue was there too—he joined the label in April 2020, bringing with him a youth-centric, subversive approach. Absent of any overt influences, he was interested in mood rather than a specific adaptation of colour, print, or style.

That mood was shaped by the decade-long influence of Manuela Pavesi, who passed away in 2015. Pavesi was Mrs. Prada’s consultant, strategist and an image maker in his own right, who joined the brand in 2005 after a time as an editor at Vogue Italia. She also encouraged Jonathan Anderson, to launch his own brand. At that moment, Anderson was under her stewardship while he worked in Prada's merchandising department. His pre-fall 2012 was pure Pavesi, with its uniform style pieces and colours lifted directly from a plastic Tesco shopping bag.

This visual dissonance was also found in the summer 2025 range, with discernible nods to 1950s/60s “ladylike” garments such as a Kelly-green suede jacket with a Claudine collar mixed with a baggy black trouser tucked into a pair of white cowboy boots and a crimson pullover with an azure collar with a silver A-line leather skirt covered in large eyelets. There was a tweed three-button coat with narrow shoulders worn over a swimsuit with vertical stripes in shades of brown. There was a range of accessories, namely handbags and shoes that felt they could be archival; newer styles had gold chain and tortoiseshell buckle details.

Prada Spring Summer 2025. Look 2

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Later, a 1960s Courrèges-style coat with false patch pockets was reduced to a slither in the form of a bandeau, styled with trousers with an trompe l’oeil belt and oversized sunglasses. Following the coat was a pistachio green wool coat with a slubby pile and a fur collar styled with space-age glasses and China pink stockings. Eschewing adherence to any specific period, there were embellished long skirts with sweaters tucked in, skirts (whether wool, others embellished with tube, diamond and bicone beads) suspended from leather waist belts with metal clips, a dress with huge mirrored paillettes and a crome yellow windbreaker. A shift dress covered in rings traces Simons’ Spring/Summer 2019 show and gave a New Romantics twist to the proceedings.

The collection and these looks questioned the fundamentals of good taste. Mrs. Prada, who balanced her role in the Italian Communist Party with rehearsals at Milan's Piccolo Teatro, has long played with bourgeois expectations of art and luxury. As sociologist Pierre Bourdieu noted, the bourgeoisie often fails to recognise the avant-garde, clinging only to what reinforces its self-assurance. Prada’s use of what some might consider "ugly" or unconventional materials continues to challenge these norms.

Prada’s Spring/Summer 1996 collection introduced the phrase “ugly chic” into fashion’s lexicon and Mrs. Prada has previously spoken of a desire for “changing the system of the bourgeoisie (and) how to break the system from inside [of] what was considered beauty.” Spring/Summer 1996 saw models Amber Valletta, Kate Moss, and Kristen McMenamy in clashing print combinations of purple, chartreuse and wenge brown. Writer and semiotician Umberto Eco explained that “even ugliness may serve as a suitable means of expression. Fashions of the past, especially of the recent past, are usually deemed ugly. This is because shifts in sensibility can develop only by opposition.” Those oppositions lend Prada's 2025 collection its power; the 'ugliness' creates a supplementary set of standards. To borrow from Eco's extol, while beauty may have its limits, ugly is boundless.