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January 19, 2006

Bad television reception qualifies as Milan fashion week's most idiosyncratic inspiration, which will probably make the independent-minded Italo Zucchelli very happy. The pixelated bands of color on his knitwear and the black-and-white distortion that patterned an entire suit had the abstract but graphic quality that the Calvin Klein menswear designer has always loved. Again on show in his tailoring were the tonic fabric effects he is also partial to, though he's shortened the jackets, broadened the shoulders, and significantly tightened the trousers for fall. The result: a chunky bully-boy silhouette.

In the past, Zucchelli's collections have been built on a face-off between smooth and rough, and that dichotomy was evident here too. On the one hand, there was a shirt stitched in sophisticated grids; on the other, a leather sweatshirt with zippered shoulders. And the face-off continued in Zucchelli's new focus on the coat, which he offered in an array of fabrics: Harris tweed, nubbly wool, shearling with exposed seams, and gabardine, matched to trousers.

The famed Calvin Klein affinity for the American Southwest came through in a chunky sweater that, from one sleeve to another, was graded to suggest sunset shading into night. There were also—again the smooth with the rough—lizard loafers that could have slipped straight off a reptile's back.

— Tim Blanks