Tod's Diego Della Valle on the "seismic shift" of the end of seasonality

Seasons are no longer what they used to be, and the fashion calendar is changing too. While many in the industry are complaining, the owner of Italian footwear and apparel label Tod’s, Diego Della Valle, isn’t. In his words, this is a “seismic shift and a huge bonus” for his brand, which recently presented its collection for the next autumn/winter in Milan, based on the so-called ‘gentleman flow’, the contemporary man’s pulse.

“Seasonal collections are over, the pace of contemporary life has transformed the [fashion] calendar,” said Della Valle, adding that “the products we develop must reach the stores every two months, and advertising needs to highlight this, to all intents and purposes we’ve become a media company. It took an enormous organisational effort to bring artisans up to speed, but now there are thousands more opportunities to sell: it’s a seismic shift and a huge bonus. Nowadays, revenues are higher and risk is lower, because we have greater control on products. True, production planning wasn’t so easy to begin with, but now we are close to the ideal set-up. After all, no one would have thought that one day we’d work sometimes from home and sometimes in the office, the world is changing.”

Together with schedules, “the type of apparel is changing too,” said Della Valle, adding that “these are crossover clothes, they can be worn from Monday to Monday, the whole year round.”

Like for example Tod’s new trench coat in a water-repellent, stain-resistant ‘protective’ fabric, with a detachable padded inner lining, a coat that can be worn in all seasons. “It all stems from the notion of rhythm and fluidity in contemporary men’s lifestyle,” said designer Andrea Incontri as he illustrated next winter’s novelties. “Considering formal and casual wear as separate is now an anachronism, this is a crossover, fluid wardrobe, with items that are very different from one another but are linked together through this concept,” said Incontri.

Tod’s urban line features a bomber jacket, a trench coat and a three-button jacket, all of them reversible, because nowadays “seasonality is over and items must be highly durable,” added Incontri. Like Tod’s iconic gommino driving shoe with rubber-pebble sole, now revamped with a nod to avant-garde car design featuring a hi-tech inner sock, as an alternative to the classic cap shoe, with a rubber toe cap decorated with the label’s signature 'gommino' motif.