For Spring-Summer 2024, Maximilian Davis explores and evolves the codes he has developed at Ferragamo, imbuing his distinct aesthetic with organic ease while drawing on the relationship between balance and tension. “I wanted things to feel a lot lighter, both in terms of fabric and construction but also in terms of how people want to dress,” Davis explains. “There’s a familiarity I have found in the Italian way of dressing and living: an effortlessness which feels very Caribbean. The idea of doing everything at your own pace, on your own time.”
While drawing parallels between the spirit of Italian and Caribbean dress codes, the collection also finds inspiration in the situated contrasts of Italy’s Arte Povera movement, which often positioned natural materials alongside industrial elements and elevated the everyday through careful consideration. For Spring-Summer 2024, humble linens and cotton are approached with rigorous finesse, bonded onto satins for capes or treated to appear as leather; sculptural wooden accessories and details polished to perfection; precise silhouettes expressed in natural fabrics. “I really wanted the pieces to feel very pure and honest; for the collection to be relatable within a wardrobe, but interesting in terms of the touch of the hand.”
Throughout, there appears a subversive interplay between restraint and freedom: a slouching insouciance is expressed in the worn texture of leather tailoring, while pristine mid-century tailoring is slashed into fluidity. Viscose jersey drapery, rooted in Ferragamo’s Florentine heritage and echoed in 18th century Caribbean dress, now appears paired with the language of Renaissance armor: molded spazzolato leather bodices and rigid, high-shine inserts.
The perverse sensibility inherent to Davis’ work remains quietly omnipresent: elegant day dresses paired with high patent boots or cut deep at the chest, men’s loungewear shorts cropped high on the thigh, T-shirts twisted as though quickly pulled on. “Fetishism is something that runs through the DNA of my work,” he explains. “There’s something modern about incorporating that in your daily life and daily wardrobe.”
