Armani, Prada, and Other Bigwigs Unite to Save Milan Fashion Week

Fall 2010 Milan Fashion Week was kind of an organizational disaster. After learning Anna Wintour would only be in town for three days, Milan's top designers frantically contacted Fashion Week authorities about changing their show times. And when one person changes — especially a big name like Armani or Fendi — everyone has to change to a time that won't overlap so that the most important showgoers can make it. However, next season Milan's top houses won't stand for a three- or four-day Fashion Week. The houses of Armani and Prada have united and will accept nothing less than a seven-day Fashion Week.

All the big names in Milan — the "unmissables" — have agreed to show evenly across the seven days, so that press and buyers have to stay for the whole thing. Giorgio Armani said the agreement demonstrates that the Italians "are perfectly able to assert [them]selves without fear." Prada chief Patrizio Bertelli said the decision "underlines a sense of belonging we have been afraid of losing because of recent controversies." But the question is, are seven forced days in Milan likely to make Fashion Week attendees any less grumpy than four incredibly hectic ones? Times fashion critic Cathy Horyn called fall 2010 Fashion Week in Milan "an eternity of bad clothes crammed into four days," and lamented the loss of Tom Ford's Gucci shows. What Milan Fashion Week organizers should do is tell everyone Tom Ford will show his womenswear there at a to-be-determined address and date, and not let him show until the end of the last day. That will hold the fashion people captive and get them to stop grumping about it.