How does a luxury brand like Prada sell desire to a public inundated with beautiful images? It hires Ferdinando Verderi.

The Man Who Translates Fashion

- Cathy Horyn

IT'S A FAST-MOVING runway season with new designers at Chanel and Dior, among other houses, and in Milan last month, Miuccia Prada and her co-creative director, Raf Simons, seized the moment to be more contrarian than usual.

Their show opened with two ordinary work uniforms, like the kind UPS drivers wear, before the clothing shapes began to break up and recompose themselves into new forms. A top that suggested a bra was a mere flutter of fabric and certainly useless as a bra. More curious still was a soft knee-length skirt suspended from the shoulders on two long, thin straps. Although Prada and Simons added underlayers, like bras and uniform shirts, the cut of the skirt nonetheless left a large void at the center of the body. The designers said an aim was to move away from the sculptural aspect of high fashion and make styles that can shift and adapt, but to some critics, they had removed the clothes, too. The show, in the best Prada tradition, divided opinion.

But how will people feel about the collections a few months from now, when the shows have been forgotten and they're just looking for something new to wear? And how will brands communicate the intentions of their designers? The answer is through ad campaigns. It's the nebulous part of the business of selling desire, one that insiders don't find nearly as interesting as the runway drama and that the non-fashion world doesn't even know exists.

These days, a luxury ad campaign must accomplish a difficult task. How do you show the meaning of clothes in an image-saturated world and connect with an audience that is technologically fast but also wants authenticity from brands? You hire a creative director—these days, preferably one who comes up with ideas, not images.