Sartorial, ethical, sustainable: the fashion of Venice Fashion Week

The Planet’s resources, the talents of artisans, and sustainability interpreted through fashion, lifestyle, and tourism are the themes that Venice Fashion Week has highlighted in its 2022 edition presenting the Made in Venice version of fashion

More than 80 creative designers, 50 locations, more than 40 Italian and international brands, 5 conferences, 3000 accredited guests, journalists, and buyers, unconventional fashion shows, the first salon for handcrafted accessories, a day of showrooms, the conscious shopping weekend with more than 40 boutiques and ateliers open across the city’s “sestieri”, and a day dedicated to sustainable tourism aboard Repower’s electric boat: the 2022 edition of Venice Fashion Week presented Venice as the place for a debate on the future.

The declared intention was to spotlight haute couture and high craftsmanship in the fashion scene; the event, now in its tenth edition, told an international audience about the Made in Venice version of fashion: a compelling sartorial story made up of precious products, masters, cultural contaminations and Venice as a source of inspiration.

#VFW22 themes

These events and themes emerged at the tenth edition of Venice Fashion Week, which was promoted by Venezia da Vivere, a network of communication, cultural projects, and event organisation.

The leitmotif of the event is sustainability, a crucial theme for the city of Venice which seeks new models for quality tourism. The challenge passes through the valorisation of high craftsmanship that contributes to uniting the legacy of the past with new horizons for sustainable lifestyles.

Fashion meets craftsmanship in hotel suites, workshops, and art galleries: the artists Séverina Lartigue and the very young Nadia Syrkova have transformed the Magazzino Gallery in Palazzo Polignac into a workshop of silk flowers for haute couture and handmade hats; the partnership between Liviana Conti and the artisan company Lunardelli Venezia has produced a fashion exhibition in the carpentry workshop and furnishing accessories in the boutique. To present the new collection of sartorial kimonos In Azur, fashion designer Antonia Sautter transported her tailoring and the artists at work to the Renaissance spaces of Palazzo Nani, the new Radisson Hotel in Venice.

For three days, the Sebastiano Ricci suite of the Palazzo Sagredo hotel hosted the art of Burano lace by Atelier Martina Vidal. In the spaces of the Boutique Hotel Ca Maria Adele, guests were treated to a performance by models in the suites, who interpreted Myss Duval‘s fashion collection and In Barberia‘s handcrafted glasses by designer Nicola Zenella.

And while Palazzo Sagredo came alive with fashion shows and tableaux vivants with stylists Mirco Giovannini and Hélène Kuhn Ferruzzi, and emerging labels Gaiofatto by Michela Gaiofatto, Romeo de Julieta, and Endelea, an award-winning ethical fashion start-up, craftsmanship, and design were the stars of Ornamenti, the handicraft and design accessory fair with over 35 exhibitors, illuminated by the Sette Lampade per Venezia (Seven Lamps for Venice) exhibition.

Conferences, workshops, and meetings with the Masters enriched the event: Confartigianato Sarti organised the Upcycling workshop, Camera Buyer and Italian Artisan took part in the round table The value of craft production for fashion buyers, digital creator Judith Bradl, invited by Venice Fashion Week to interpret Ornamenti with her visual language, and Alessandra De Nitto of Fondazione Cologni contributed to the workshop The communication of craftsmanship with new digital tools.

Venice Fashion Week is always an opportunity to celebrate critical figures in the sector: two Maestri d’arte e mestieri (MAM), the recognition awarded by the Fondazione Cologni dei Mestieri d’Arte, a partner in the event, were celebrated during these days: Sebastiano Lunardelli and Franco Puppato. The latter presented his haute couture menswear designs at the Hotel St. Regis. Carlos Tieppo, the director of the Atelier Costumes of the Teatro La Fenice, was also celebrated together with his tailors in an exciting conference in which we were able to see and experience the creative moments of the historic tailor’s shop.

Atelier Aperti 2022

Sustainability as a way of life is the mantra of the Atelier Aperti weekend: more than 40 artisans opened workshops and boutiques to show their collections in the “botteghe” (local shops), places where the creative process that leads to the creation of unique garments and objects begins.

“Venice presents itself as an exemplary city for the transition to sustainability,” pointed out organisers Laura Scarpa, Lorenzo Cinotti, and Jacopo Casotto. “It has always been a “slow” factory of ethical fashion, characterised by precious and durable fabrics. The event aims to transform the city into a laboratory of creative talents, including university students, from all over the world”.

“A communication repositioning of Venice is underway. We have worked to intercept new forces, energies, and strands to nurture. Among these is fashion, both in terms of fashion shows and the valorisation of territorial excellence,” says Councillor Simone Venturini: “Venice’s calendar is now studded with fashion events, initiatives of great international appeal. Here comes sought-after tourism in search of authentic, exclusive, and unique creations, such as those of our craftsmen in the fashion, wood, jewellery, and glass sectors. Combining tourism and craftsmanship, elevates Venice, which is now also proposing itself as the capital of sustainable fashion. Let’s get back to exclusive garments that last, created with passion, and with precious raw materials. Venice Fashion Week allows you to discover the artisanal beauty of Venice“.

“The city lends itself to welcoming the initiative in the best possible way because quality, sustainability, and exclusive craftsmanship are part of its DNA,” added Councillor Paola Mar. “Art, fashion, and luxury craftsmanship have always been produced in Venice. Great weavings have been produced here since the XI century; silk working as an example, and fantastic jewellery was also produced. Venice is a sustainable place, the forge of equally sustainable craftsmanship: in fact, no large-scale production has ever taken place in the city”.

“The future of Venice is to become a venue for a global dialogue on sustainability, a platform for the inclusion of creative talents in fashion and design, a destination for a type of tourism that is attentive to the culture of beauty and respect for the territory,” said Marina Iremonger, strategic consultant of Venice Fashion Week and for over 20 years promoter of sustainable fashion and emerging designers.

“Thanks to Venice Fashion Week, several subjects are brought together, from Repower with its sustainable mobility ecosystem to many realities of the fashion world, including the opening of many luxury hotels to the public,” said Fabrizio D’Oria, director of Vela. “In this way, Venice truly becomes a protagonist and not a showcase city. Projects like that of the Repower^e boat are held in high regard by the administration, which has already launched electric buses on the island of Lido.”

“The goal is for sustainable mobility to be seen for what it already is: a key business lever for tourism, capable of intercepting demand that is increasingly attentive to sustainability at every moment of the travel experience,” explained Davide Damiani of Repower Italia.

Sustainable tourism was the theme of the meeting between the directors of some of the most important hotels in the city, such as Alain Bullo of the Londra Palace Hotel, Patrizia Hofer of the St. Regis Hotel, Gioele Romanelli of Hotel Flora, Casa Fora, Hotel Novecento and Inside Venice, Gloria Beggiato of Hotel Metropole, Gianluca Lorenzet of the boutique hotel Corte di Gabriela and Andrea Di Maso of Hotel Luna Baglioni, which took place on board the electric boat Repower^e.

“It has emerged how much sustainability is demanded by the very customers who come to Venice, a city that, due to its conformation, lends itself to becoming a laboratory for experimenting new forms of quality tourism” has concluded Laura Scarpa, summarising the focal points of the exchange between those who are involved with visitors arriving in the city.

VENICE FASHION WEEK

The next editions: 30 March – 2 April 2023 18 – 28 October 2023

The event is on: @Veneziadavivere, and @Venicefashionweek. Hashtags: #venicefashionweek #VFW22

Venice Fashion Week is a project of Venezia da Vivere, a Venetian company that deals with digital communication, projects for the city, and events.

The illustrator Jacopo Ascari is the creator of the official poster of Venice Fashion Week 2022.

Photos by Marta Formentello, Igor Serdyukov, and Judith Bradl for Venice Fashion Week 2022, and Venezia da Vivere.

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Sartorial, ethical, sustainable: the fashion of Venice Fashion Week