The guest designer of Pitti Uomo, Wales Bonner’s S/S 2023 collection explored the history of Black presence in the city with an era-spanning show at the Palazzo Medici Riccardi. Here, she expla...
The guest designer of Pitti Uomo, Wales Bonner’s S/S 2023 collection explored the history of Black presence in the city with an era-spanning show at the Palazzo Medici Riccardi. Here, she explains the story behind the collectionThe Renaissance splendour of the Palazzo Medici Riccardi – the Medici dynasty’s first commissioned residence – provided the backdrop for Grace Wales Bonner’s latest collection, shown in Florence as part of Pitti Uomo .
The idea of arrival was inscribed into the collection’s garments, beginning with a T-shirt imprinted with the work of American artist Kerry James Marshall . Wales Bonner said she was thinking about the Medicis being patrons of the arts; for her, Marshall is ‘a master painter of our time’.
On the front of a booklet left on each attendee’s seat, the designer referenced Sankofa – a principle which derives from the Akan people of Ghana and means that in order to make progress in the future, one must remember the past . ‘Melodies ring forward like the flight of a bird – Sankofa arrives, adorned in the radiance of the past, pointing towards new paths, alternative processions for an eclectic cast,’ it read.