For the Marni Pre-Fall 2021 collection, black was featured prominently, providing a dark space of exploration from where newness could flourish. The extensive presence of black was perhaps intended as a metaphor for the limitations and restrictions of our times, contrasted by the need for softness and comfort.

The concept was twisted into a play on deconstructed shapes, treated as collapsing carapaces melting and dissolving around the body. “I wanted to soften the formal to a point of extreme suppleness and malleability,” Francesco Risso explained.

Square-cut, roomy, reversible tweed coats were snapped open and recast as fringed blanket-sized mutations to be wrapped around the body like protective stoles. Risso took a tactile, artsy approach to the shredded edges and raw hems of tartan kilts worn over matching trousers, to hand-drawn watercolor florals printed on soft-draped asymmetrical dresses, and to blurry grids airbrushed on tailored suits.