Ian Griffiths described pre-fall as “a collection built on simplicity and versatility, two ideas everyone claims to love, yet few designers dare to truly embrace. Fashion has a habit of mistaking complexity for cleverness,” he went on. “Designing something simple that people actually want to wear can be one of the hardest tricks in the book.” He argued that in architecture, no one would ever suggest that a minimalist like John Pawson is somehow less talented than a designer of Gothic follies. “Decoration in architecture is hardly a badge of good design, often the opposite. Fashion, however, tends to lose its nerve, drifting toward embellishment instead of trusting restraint.”
Max Mara has been consistently true to principles of practicality, quality, wearability, and good design since its inception. “At a moment when the world is craving clarity, our customers, who are successful, busy women, want edited choices: fewer pieces, more possibilities,” remarked Griffith. “The purpose is not making more clothes, but better ones. To sell less, if you like, and sell it better, giving her exactly what she needs, and nothing she doesn’t.”
Modernism as an inspiration has always suited Max Mara: slender, uncomplicated lines, no decorative flourishes, and never construction for construction’s sake. The house’s aesthetic has evolved over time, but its core has barely shifted, and that continuity became the starting point for pre-fall. Champions of the modernist aesthetic like Nancy Cunard and Dorothy Parker were on Griffith’s moodboard, while diving into the archives revealed a 1989 jacket so sharply tailored it could still sit in a modern wardrobe. Paired with slouchy, low-waisted trousers, it became a template for the collection’s uncomplicated, sleek look as a reminder that “good design ages far better than trends ever do.”
Rendered in dark blue and white, the breezy collection riffed on Max Mara’s signatures: impeccably tailored yet fluid pantsuits; bias-cut dresses that glide from day into evening; a graphic abstract floral as the sole counterpoint; and plissés deployed to add a flicker of movement.
Griffiths has steered Max Mara’s creative direction for an impressively long stretch—a rarity on today’s fashion merry-go-round of constant changes. Asked about the current state of fashion, he was characteristically measured, yet he said that he doesn’t envy designers expected to reinvent a house in a single season. “Truly understanding a brand, its heritage, values, and visual language, takes time, and rushing risks discarding what matters most.” Too often now, he noted, you see the designer before you see the brand. “At Max Mara, it has never been about personal flair or showing cleverness, but about the house itself,” he remarked. That restraint, he suggested, takes confidence, perhaps one earned through longevity. After a turbulent season crowded with debuts, his hope is that things settle, and that enduring brands are once again allowed to speak in their own, unique voices.
