Roberto Cavalli: The man who gave us distressed denims and skinny jeans

Nowhere else was the impact of the fashion industry on the clothes we wear articulated as deftly as in the film, The Devil Wears Prada (2006). There’s a moment where fashion editor Miranda Priestley (Meryl Streep) tells her assistant Andy (Anne Hathway), who believes that high fashion is elitist and offensive to her liberal sensibilities, about what a designer blue sweater represents. “… that sweater is not just blue, it’s not turquoise, it’s not lapis, it’s actually cerulean. And you’re also blithely unaware of the fact that in 2002, Oscar de la Renta did a collection of cerulean gowns… Then it filtered down through the department stores…. that blue represents millions of dollars of countless jobs… and it’s sort of comical how you think that you’ve made a choice that exempts you from the fashion industry when, in fact, you’re wearing a sweater that was selected for you by the people in this room,” says Priestley. That speech sums up the democratic core of maverick fashion guru Roberto Cavalli, who died on April 12 at the age of 83. Cavalli was a designer who defined boho chic with working-class aspirations.

Known for his maximalist designs, be it the animal-inspired leopard prints and zebra stripes, his beaded gowns or the many-feathered layers in psychedelic colours, Cavalli’s excesses were a rebellion against the minimalist and classical conventionality of high fashion. At heart, Cavalli never forgot about his origins. So when he made printed sweaters, he drew inspiration from his early days of struggle in Florence and his mother’s paintings. In the hard days of post-war Europe, his mother turned into a dressmaker who hand-painted her creations. It was while doing ready-to-wear sweaters for Mariuccia Mandelli of Krizia, that they both hit upon the idea of simulating wild-beast pelts. This was not about Cavalli’s indulgent excess but about paying tribute to impressionist animal paintings and his nature philosophy.

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Then came the painted leather that got acceptance at Hermès and Pierre Cardin. And though he had endorsements from Hollywood icons Brigitte Bardot and Sophia Loren, when he first opened his boutique at St Tropez on the French Riviera in 1972, jeans became his leitmotif, a symbol of his own working class moorings.

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How Cavalli’s distressed and skinny jeans filtered down to us and became our most casual fashion statement is a story in itself. The designer actually used dirty worn-out jeans from a US prison, washed, cut and patchworked pieces with leather and printed textiles for a collection in 1972. It became a cult phenomenon, emblematic of hippy-rock chic. He also made fashion eclectic for the first time. If we mix and match what we wear today, we owe it to Cavalli.

By 1988, he presented his printed jeans and by 1994, he arrived with the first sand-blasted pair. It is said that he distressed the jeans himself, printed a snake motif entwining a leg, and chose Black supermodel Naomi Campbell to wear it on the ramp. The symbolism of a blue collar fabric, a reptile that’s hardly considered beautiful and breaking the racist stranglehold on the ramp was his way of bubbling up what society then considered passe.

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When assessing Cavalli’s legacy, one has to look beyond his larger-than-life persona. He was disruptive in his sensibilities but also astute in tapping into the needs of the market. He invented stretch jeans with lycra, making jeans malleable and comfortable in any climate. Since then it has become the go-to wear with flexibility, ease and comfort for working people around the world. He allowed everybody a right to own it, be it a college student or the electrician, launching a cheaper line, Cavalli Jeans, in 2000. It was fuelled by the dream of that boy from Florence who wanted to show how self-made pedigree had a far stronger imprint than bloodlines.

rinku.ghosh@expressindia.com