Designer Research: Miuccia Prada
Designer Research: Miuccia Prada
Jacqueline Falcon
University of North Texas
Unconventional, visionary, “ugly chic”; these are all words used to describe the undoubtedly influential Miuccia Prada. Miuccia Prada’s footprint on the fashion industry is both significant and enduring in an industry where trends and designers fade out as quickly as the come in. Although Prada is often noted as the anti-thesis of a typical designer, or the anti-fashionista, her work as a designer and artist influences and inspires both the traditional and untraditional (Miuccia Prada: The Reluctant Fashionista, n.d). Miuccia Prada has created a strong identity for herself as a designer who combines the avant-garde with the ready-to-wear, the ugly with the delicate, luxury without the sex appeal, and a classicism that often embraces outlandish fusions of colors and patterns. She describes her own work as a way to “express, in a simple banal object, a great complexity about women, aesthetics, and current times”(Lovinski, 2010). Even with no formal background or training in design, Prada still creates fashions that are ahead of the times, constantly pushing herself to new limits and often embracing what she even typically dislikes to find beauty in the unordinary.
Miuccia Prada was born in Milan on May 10, 1949 into a family of luxury leather goods manufacturers (Craven, 2008). Throughout the 1970s she was a champion for women’s rights and infamously part of the Italian Communist Party (Craven, 2008). In 1977, she met her husband and now business partner Patrizio Bertelli, who is now the driving force behind her business (Galloni, 2010). It was not until after she finished her PhD in Political Science, and a five-year stint studying mime at the Teatro Picco, that she took over her family’s business in 1978 (Craven, 2008). By 1985 Miuccia Prada had already created her first breakthrough line: black, unlabeled, finely woven, nylon handbags that
Jacqueline Falcon
University of North Texas
Unconventional, visionary, “ugly chic”; these are all words used to describe the undoubtedly influential Miuccia Prada. Miuccia Prada’s footprint on the fashion industry is both significant and enduring in an industry where trends and designers fade out as quickly as the come in. Although Prada is often noted as the anti-thesis of a typical designer, or the anti-fashionista, her work as a designer and artist influences and inspires both the traditional and untraditional (Miuccia Prada: The Reluctant Fashionista, n.d). Miuccia Prada has created a strong identity for herself as a designer who combines the avant-garde with the ready-to-wear, the ugly with the delicate, luxury without the sex appeal, and a classicism that often embraces outlandish fusions of colors and patterns. She describes her own work as a way to “express, in a simple banal object, a great complexity about women, aesthetics, and current times”(Lovinski, 2010). Even with no formal background or training in design, Prada still creates fashions that are ahead of the times, constantly pushing herself to new limits and often embracing what she even typically dislikes to find beauty in the unordinary.
Miuccia Prada was born in Milan on May 10, 1949 into a family of luxury leather goods manufacturers (Craven, 2008). Throughout the 1970s she was a champion for women’s rights and infamously part of the Italian Communist Party (Craven, 2008). In 1977, she met her husband and now business partner Patrizio Bertelli, who is now the driving force behind her business (Galloni, 2010). It was not until after she finished her PhD in Political Science, and a five-year stint studying mime at the Teatro Picco, that she took over her family’s business in 1978 (Craven, 2008). By 1985 Miuccia Prada had already created her first breakthrough line: black, unlabeled, finely woven, nylon handbags that
References: Blanks, Tim. (2010, September). Prada. Retrieved from: http://www.style.com/fashionshows/review/S2011RTW-PRADA Buxbaum, Geru. (1991) Icons of Fashion: The 20th Century. New York, NY: Prestel Publishing Callani, Antonio Horyn, Cathy. (2000, May). It’s Not Just Something in the Air; Its Miuccia Prada’s Influence. Koh, Dana. (2011, January). The Asian Frontier. Retrieved from: www.asiatatler.com/singapore/sg_tatler.../STJan11-Feature2.pdf Lovinski, Noel Palomo. (2010). The World’s Most Influential Fashion Designers. Hauppauge, NY: Barron’s Educational Series Inc. Martin, J.J. (2010, October). Bold Face Milan. Retrieved from: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/17/t-magazine/17well-portfolio-