Review of Dsquared2 Spring 2024 Men’s Fashion Show
Miami Vice
By Mark Wittmer
Lights! Camera! Smut! Spring 2024 saw Dsquared2 get back in touch with its overtly sexy roots while exploring the glitz and sleaze of an idealized Miami.
One of the brand’s most iconic campaigns, Fall 2004, was laid out like a storyboard for a vintage erotic film – now, almost 20 years later, the reference has come full circle, rebooted for a new generation with some fun nods to the old.
Dsquared2 had given themselves a tough act to follow; the brand’s last show was a triumphant celebration of their nearly three-decade run as masters of the mashup, a kind of greatest-hits remix compilation that reminded us why their spirit of layering and liberation is more relevant than ever delivered with over-the-top runway energy. Today’s show needed to match this energy while carrying the story forward, and it rose to the occasion.
Dean and Dan think of their collections as stories, and this practice has become more and more apparent in recent seasons. These stories center around one protagonist: a sort of archetypal Dsquared2 man, a hero – or antihero – whose journey develops across the course of the collection. This season’s story is one of seduction and liberation set in the hypergraphic world of Miami nightlife: an east-coast prep-school himbo relocates to Miami and is quickly corrupted by the glitz, sleaze, and disco fever, becoming a porn star and using this new income stream to fund his fondness for club-ready clothes. (Playing to Dsquared2’s demographics, the collection is about two thirds men’s looks and one-third women’s, which provide a playfully lascivious counterpoint to the street-wise he-man looks).
Accordingly, the first sequence of looks find him in his pre-fall state: smart and colorful riffs on country club and rugby staples are given the Dsquared2 treatment through hybridity, layering, and graphic and glittery splashes. Like any good beginning to a story, a taste of the climax to come (double entendres intended) is present in latent form within these looks – and in not so latent form in the set design, which situates us in the pink-walled interior of a Miami condo where a porno videotape shoot is in full swing.
From here the seduction and corruption begin to creep in: shorts are swapped for bedazzled speedos, chests are bared, dresses are teeny tiny, bling abounds. In addition to the graphic prints that cheekily reference erotic films and magazines, the time spent in Miami can be felt through beachy motifs – including some sequin-spangled looks that play nicely to the impending mermaidcore trend – and bold patterns that reference art deco, Memphis, and psychedelic aesthetics.
All the while, the prep origins are still quietly felt in the presence of a pinstripe tie worn as a belt or a loosely draped cardigan.
But perhaps the boldest moments of the show were the introductions of its surprise guest stars. First up was Rocco Siffredi (AKA the Italian Stallion), Italy’s legendary king of smut. Next was Julia Fox, who, while she didn’t continue the adult film theme, has become a distinct and high-profile face in the fashion scene over the last few seasons both on and off the runway, and her presence is sure to make waves across the digital realm. Finally, the show was closed by Spanish supermodel Esther Cañadas, who wore a cut-out black evening dress with a bejeweled lobster clasp as she ended the night with elegant mystique.
Sexy, bombastic, and delightfully Dsquared2, the show held nothing back in its celebration of liberation and liberated media consumption.
