IT3980 Italian Fashion and Design
IT3980 Italian Fashion and Design
Term 1
Convenor: Dr Daniela Cerimonia
Assessment
30% Essay 1 (2,000 – 2,500 words)
60% Essay 2 (2,500-3,000 words)
10% Oral presentation
Overview
The course explores the role of fashion and design in Italy in the period 1945-1994. We look at the ways in which design and fashion interacted with major economic, cultural and societal trends. The first part of this course focuses on Italian design in the postwar period, with particular emphasis on the development of furniture, interior, and industrial design. The work of a number of architects/designers such as Gio Ponti, the Castiglioni brothers, Ettore Sottsass and Alessandro Mendini are analysed in detail. The analysis of Italian fashion focuses on the creation of the so-called ‘Italian style’ and on the passage from couture fashion to the ready-to-wear industry of the late 20th century with a particular focus on the work of Emilio Pucci, Gianni Versace and Giorgio Armani.
Key Bibliography:
1. Italian culture and society in the post-war period
Forgacs and R. Lumley (eds), Italian Cultural Studies (Oxford: Oxford Univeristy Press, 1996)Forgacs, David, Italian Culture in the Industrial Era (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1990)
Ginsborg, Paul, Italy and its discontents: family, civil society, state 1980-2001 (London: Allen Lane, 2001)
Ginsborg, Paul, A history of contemporary Italy: society and politics, 1943-1988 (London: Penguin, 1990)
2. Italian design
Börnsen-Holtmann, Nina, Italian Design (Cologne: Benedikt Taschen , c1994)
Sparke, Penny, Italian Design: 1870 to the Present (London: Thames and Hudson, 1988
3. Italian Fashion
Celant, Germano, Giorgio Armani, catalogue of the exhibition (London and New York: Harry N. Abrahams, 2000)
Martin, Richard, Versace (London: Thames and Hudson, 1997)
White, Nicola, Reconstructing Italian fashion (Oxford and New York: Berg, 2000)