How will it fare in the birthplace of haute couture?
Here, some insights from Muller.
From the Palazzo Reale in Milan to the Grand Palais in Paris, what has changed?
Photo: Mark Blower/ Courtesy of Dolce & Gabbana
This is almost as it was in Milan.
We tried this idea of having an exhibition that can travel.
And we tried to keep the decor as much as we could.
Photo: Mark Blower/ Courtesy of Dolce & Gabbana
For the actual Alta Moda shows, the designers invite guests to locations around Italy.
How have you attempted to recreate this experience and connect it back to the collections?
This is the collaboration between us, because I am also like that.
Photo: Mark Blower/ Courtesy of Dolce & Gabbana
I think an exhibition is a journey.
Youre not seated like with a book or movie.
You walk, you travel through spaces.
Photo: Mark Blower/ Courtesy of Dolce & Gabbana
Even if you have not been to Italy, these rooms bring you different visions into the culture.
This next room, titled Divine Mosaics seems especially opulent.
How do you feel about this as a description for what the designers do?
Photo: Mark Blower/ Courtesy of Dolce & Gabbana
Opulence is a very good word.
For them, this story is a dream come true.
You have the idea of devotion through ideas of baroque gold and sculptural dresses.
Photo: Mark Blower/ Courtesy of Dolce & Gabbana
Its an encounter between sacred and profane.
This veil appeared in the collection in Syracuse for the 10th anniversary collection.
How is this broadening our perception of Italy?
Photo: Mark Blower/ Courtesy of Dolce & Gabbana
We are used to seeing Made in Italy in our bags, our silk made in Italy.
Its not only a privilege reserved to France.
The exhibition is an occasion to say this.
Perhaps they havent been to Sicily, but they have been to La Scala in Milan.
What is specific to Dolce & Gabbana is how the the dress is constructed on the corset.
This is their own approach.
But of course the tailoring is very important.
There is a painting here of a Madonna that was in his fathers workshop.
What is the significance of the film for them?
They are really inspired by neo-realist cinema andGattopardoisthereferencenot only because of its romantic beauty.
It expresses something they have in their process: a way of being between the past and the future.
And the entire decor is drawn from the Palazzo Gangi in Palermo, where the film was shot.
We had to send a photographer there to get to do the decor.
What about this room that is dedicated to opera and also involves a lavish food display.
Afterward, there was a lunch and thats why you see the table like a banquet.
This also represents their extravagant appetite, not only for beauty but for food.
During the work on the exhibition, we would often end the days in a trattoria.
And they would be like, Try this, try that, eat more!
How might we leave this exhibition with a little more Dolce & Gabbana in our lives?
I think the dolce vita, this joy of life, is something people will keep, too.
This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.
