Exotic-animal-print maximalism was the vibe at Roberto Cavalli SS16.

Push it to the Limit

“Freedom of body” was key to Peter Dundas, the new Roberto Cavalli creative-director, this season. And in a sense, Cavalli has always been concerned with freedom: the freedom to push designs into the realm of maximalism, the freedom to throw leopard print around with abandon, and yes, the freedom to dabble in what might occasionally be perceived as bad taste. All three things were represented here, and so they should be.

Roar Baby!

A blazer that appeared to be made from a paisley-type fabric was shown, upon closer inspection, to be a high-impact lion head print – a not so subtle nod to the atmosphere of animalistic-sexuality that so often seems to go hand-in-hand with Cavalli’s clothing and campaigns. Then there was a sleeveless perfecto jacket fabricated in a kind of aggressively-stonewashed pink denim that recalled Cavalli’s famous sandblasted jeans. That other leitmotif, exposed flesh, was also present and correct with a great number of cut-outs and lots of leg on show.

She’s on Fire

Club-wear (sometimes eighties, sometimes early noughties) was probably the best way to describe much of this: leather trousers, tight-dresses, animal print this and that etc. The thing is, where other label’s flirt with the deliberately ‘tasteless’, playing ironically with this or that (a sequin here, a print there), this season at Cavalli was full on Tony Montana’s Scarface mansion: admirably brave, unabashedly money but not, by any stretch of the imagination, subtle.

Words: Benji Walters