Memories of FASHION

Archives represent today more than ever an important asset for fashion houses. A source of inspiration to design one's own future, but also the winning card of a legacy that fascinates new generations. In search of history and culture, but also of a pre-digital past.

- CRISTINA MANFREDI, GIULIA GILEBBI

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“The true art of memory is attention.” This was the opinion of Samuel Johnson, an 18th-century British literary critic, poet and essayist, and judging from what has been happening with fashion houses in the last few years, fashion is proving him right. Whether they are landmark brands or more recent ones, companies often keep an inside archive where the aesthetic and cultural heritage of the individuals who brought those brands to success are collected and preserved, something that we probably take for granted today, as we are used to celebrities like Zendaya excitedly wear terrific vintage pieces at official events (thanks to, it must be said, super designers like Law Roach).

On the one hand, western fashion, intended as an industrialised system, has reached an age when it is natural to look back and acknowledge what has been done. On the other hand, the obsession for an ephemeral present, as dictated by social media, unleashes the opposite reaction, as proven by the many accounts dedicated to the collections of the past. This is perfectly stated by Italian actor Marco Paolini in his book Ausmerzen, “Remembering today is an act of civility, a personal challenge against the dictatorship of the present that makes us all informed and distracted but condemned to sudden oblivion.”

But how do brands contend with their heritage? In this wild ride among vintage pieces, books, newspaper clippings, fabric selvedges and 3D digitisation,