Day 15 of fashion month, and it takes something great to get an exhausted fashion crowd excited. It requires something seriously special to get them up on their feet. But standing on their seats and whooping? That demands a capital-M-Megastar-moment.
On Friday night in Milan, Versace delivered exactly that. As the last model circled the room, hundreds of images of Jennifer Lopez in that scrolled up on the walls in that precipitously plunging jungle print dress she wore to the Grammy Awards in 2000, as Donatella Versace’s voice boomed: ‘OK, Google, now show me the real thing’. And then… J.LO herself appeared, closing the show in an updated (read: even more risqué) version the dress. Sashaying along the catwalk, wafting the chiffon train behind her, she looked as magnificent as ever. It was fashion at its most fun, fierce and fabulously camp. The crowd went wild; the energy in the room was electric.
I hardly need tell you that, of course – you’ve already seen the images all over Instagram. It’s a fitting evolution for the iconic dress which is said to have inspired Google Image Search. 20 years ago, a time before Instagram and Twitter, smart phones and influencers, the then nascent Google was unable to handle the traffic generated from millions of people wanting to get a look at that dress.
The J.LO moment was the perfect finale to a show which delivered big on high-octane, Friday night glamour. Running late ’90s glamour through a millennial filter, today’s supers – Gigi, Bella, Kendal, Kaia, Irina, Adut – plus 45-year old Amber Valletta, took to the runway in micro LBDs, power shoulders and wet-look fuchsia and lime dresses. The revived palm print was teased throughout the show: on slides, skirts, shorts and tees. Each look felt worth Instagramming in its own right (I predict the patterned tights and mask-like shades to go wild on the ‘gram next summer).
But the night belonged to J.LO. Milan has been woefully lacking on body diversity, and while nothing about J.LO says ‘normal’ she is the owner of buffed, bronzed, goddess body that none the less, isn’t waif like. She is 50 years old and refuses to shrink away; her star is only getting brighter. She’s not just back in the dress, but a more revealing version of it. J.LO continues to exude the kind of force field A-list glamour that today’s young guns can only dream of.
And as for the rebooted palm dress? It shaped the Internet then – no doubt this time it will break it.