There are many things that Miuccia Prada hates: The banality of luxury, “good taste,” and the bourgeoisie are just a few of the topics that come up during a conversation from her art-filled home in Milan. These bugbears, however, have been useful over the years. They have given clarity to her work and provided her with something to react against in her collections, beginning in the 1980s with the introduction of handbags and backpacks made of practical black nylon, and continuing ever since with an aesthetic that the designer once described as “ugly chic.”
Prada has something else on her mind today. Three years since the pandemic upended people’s relationship with their clothes, and as her company embarks on a generational management shift that will have significant implications for its future, it troubles her that fashion is being positioned as a form of escapism or entertainment during difficult times. She wants to push back against that sentiment in the Prada collections she now codesigns with Raf Simons, but especially with her more personal and provocative Miu Miu label. The occasion for this rare audience with the designer—“Mrs. Prada,” if we are being formal—is the 30th anniversary of Miu Miu, which she started in order to explore her more experimental ideas, from dresses made of sheer nylonette in the 1990s to pleated miniskirts cut so short that the pocket linings were visible in 2021. And while Miu Miu is undeniably having a moment—the shopping app Lyst named it Brand of the Year for 2022, following several viral hits like strapped ballet flats, quilted Wander bags, and those miniskirts—Prada insists she wants to design clothes that serve a purpose, a point she returns to several times during a late-morning Zoom call, a medium that suits her efficient and direct style quite well.
“Even if something is eccentric, even if it is strange, it should always be reasonable,” says Prada of Miu Miu’s famed shoes, assembled here from a…
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