Under Alessandro Michele’s inspired leadership, the house of Gucci has been transformed. Its shows have become some of Milan Fashion Week’s most vibrant, offering up a kaleidoscope of colours, prints and motifs season after season. For its SS16 collection, Michele took inspiration from a variety of different places; including antique maps, street art and Gucci’s own archives. “...Each object in the collection is offered up as a small atlas of emotions, a treasure chest of aesthetic references, a sentimental cartography in which patterns, extraordinary craftsmanship, and rarefied materials are interwoven,” read the show notes. The same was true for the men’s SS16 collection – a crochet shirt, for example, bore a butterfly motif inspired by a painting that Michele saw on the streets of Rome. Here, to coincide with the launch of Gucci’s new website, the house gives us an insight into this “treasure chest” of references with images of their prints, animal motifs and the inspiration behind them.

Head to the gallery above to see these images.

www.gucci.com