Fashion Leaderless Gucci harks back to better days

The arithmetic of fashion goes like this: take a status brand, such as Gucci, and multiply it to the power of x by putting it in the hands of a zeitgeist-hitting designer. Pair the right label with the right person at the right moment, and you hit the jackpot.

- Jess Cartner-Morley

The arithmetic of fashion goes like this: take a status brand, such as Gucci, and multiply it to the power of x by putting it in the hands of a zeitgeist-hitting designer. Pair the right label with the right person at the right moment, and you hit the jackpot. At this Milan fashion week, Gucci's numbers were never quite going to add up. It has the illustrious high-value name, but a big fat zero where the designer should be. Sales fell 24% in the last quarter of 2024, and the designer Sabato De Sarno left a fortnight ago. The departure was expected but the timing, leaving the house without a figurehead during Milan fashion week, spoke of a brand rattled by the failure of recent collections to connect with sh