An Opulent Update at Bally

MILAN, Italy — The real squeeze in the luxury sector today is toeing an artful balance between familiarity and ingenuity. How to attract the customer, and then give them reasons to return? At Bally, the 19th century Swiss ribbon maker that found its way to fashion via footwear, the answer's been a hard sell of late, as departing creative left HQ in a scramble for relevance and brand-positioning, in a market heavy with competition and homogeneity.

Touring product placed throughout an elaborately disheveled set in Bally’s new Milanese digs, a spokesperson for the brand name-dropped both Patti Smith’s early days and William Eggleston’s domestic scenes. Their cultural cache came referenced one way or another in the season’s women’s and men’s clothing offer, one that seems to have retracted towards a more solid, luxury sportswear base after forays into cocktail and eveningwear in recent seasons proved incongruous with Bally’s upscale yet pragmatic image.

Today, the anonymous studio team drove home that conceit with a cool vintage offering of re-edition sneakers, Pan-Am style leather and canvas satchels or totes, and plenty of refined iterations on their ‘B-Turn’ leather goods (a topstitched bum bag was a natty highlight).

As far as clothing was concerned, the look leaned decidedly more Margot Tenenbaum than Patti Smith, particularly when luxe shell tracksuits in black silk or burgundy leather came paired with roomy coats in lamb shearling and floral brocade. Logo pajamas and knee-high socks added to the presentation’s sporty, stay-at-home scenario, but quiet highlights were ready for the great outdoors: a putty-coloured lambskin zipped car coat and a double-face camel cape were the subtle, opulent update that Bally clearly needed.