Set against the electric backdrop of Times Square, Gucci’s GucciCore reimagines New York style through Demna’s lens, bold, eclectic, and unmistakably Gucci.

New York has held a singular place in Gucci’s history for over 70 years, with the House opening its first store outside of Italy in the city in 1953. GucciCore serves as a homecoming for the House, staged in Times Square, one of New York’s most ubiquitous symbols, against the backdrop of its digital billboards and screens. It distills the essence of Gucci as a visual language into a collection built around a new core wardrobe.

In the ’80s, New York City was home to the Gucci Galleria, a space hidden above the Fifth Avenue flagship, accessible through a private entrance to clients who carried a specialized golden key. The GucciCore invite pays homage to the Galleria, taking the form of a brass key housed in an aged leather sleeve.

Prior to the show, a video montage combining found footage with advertisements fills Times Square’s screens, featuring real and fictitious products ranging from Gucci Acqua, Gucci Underwear, Gucci Viaggio, Gucci Automobili, Gucci Businesswear, Gucci Time, Gucci Gym, to a Palazzo Gucci hotel, Gucci Pets, Gucci High Jewelry, and Gucci Life, exploring the idea of Gucci as an ethos, a lifestyle, and an aesthetic identity.

GucciCore is a stylistic cross-section of New York City, from Madison Avenue to Brooklyn, SoHo to Harlem, and Fifth Avenue, worn by the kinds of people one might pass on the street. Stockbrokers and businesspeople in pinstripes, ladies who lunch in shearling coats worn with a studied insouciance, skaters in soft tailoring and slouchy denim, alongside perfectly poised philanthropists and socialites in gowns and pantsuits. A plurality of styles that intersect like the streets of the city.

Plush circular duvet stoles in buttersoft leather and monogrammed fabrics forego function for form, offset by pragmatic reversible coats in technical fabrics and textured shearling. The Web stripe takes the form of a bandeau top, turning a House signature since the ‘50s into a singular garment. Alta moda garments are realized in croc-scale sequins, beaded fringes, and feather embroideries that extend a sense of preciousness into menswear, while technical outerwear garments are lined in goat hair and shearling for a sense of utilitarian extravagance.

The Horsebit, an equestrian House signature, is placed as a stirrup on severe heeled boots, complementing angular stilettos with metal tips. Precious leather handbags are realized in inky tones or jewel-like patinas, wristwatch clutches have timepiece straps, and capacious unstructured sling totes are reimagined in new fabrications.

GucciCore is the 4th act of Demna’s character studies approach, bringing together the visual languages of La Famiglia, Generation Gucci, and Primavera into one single, cohesive collection, centered around a permanent wardrobe grounded in pragmatic, wearable pieces that are unmistakably Gucci.