MU+
DIGITAL SUSTAINABLE CREATIVITY
SPRING-SUMMER 2025 COLLECTIONS
 

MU+ or MU PLUS is the concept for the forthcoming Spring-Summer 2025 season, where the suffix “Plus” denotes increased use of both the analysis tools underlying creative research and content, powered by Artificial Intelligence, the true protagonist of contemporary living.

If there is a popular sentiment that AI, with its fast, methodical and systematic learning, can replace the human mind, the approach taken by the artistic director of Milano Unica, Stefano Fadda, in developing the collections for the upcoming S/S 2025 season was instead to seize the potential of AI as a means of exploring new paths and new directions. Situated in a position diametrically opposed to what popular feeling might suggest, AI proves to be an extra support for research, inventiveness and human creative flair: this is how, starting from proposals made by Italian textile and accessories companies, AI has shown a subsequent increase in new influences, original patterns and futuristic silhouettes.

In this way, Stefano Fadda presented the process behind the study and the identification of trends that resulted in MU+: «Using models and programmes that can generate images, I started from photographs, writings, drawings, illustrations, renderings and samples from our prestigious companies, treating them all as our initial databases. I developed new materials and accessories, shapes and processes, prints, embroideries and finally fabrics with my team, using AI generative algorithms tailored to our unique, instinctive, ethical, sustainable and inescapably human creative perception.»

The concept of utilising AI, moreover, has become indispensable, bearing in mind the speed with which new technologies drive knowledge and imagination, but also considering the pace of a world that craves fashion innovation, with its constant demands for collections and thus for ideas and new creative stimuli. AI inevitably fosters an unprecedented and compelling merging of human creativity (because AI in itself is not creative) and market needs, marketing and different generational targets, design and technical performance, ethics and sustainability.

The combination of all these components produced the MU PLUS format, a showcase conceived with a view to a future that integrates creativity, sustainability, digitalisation, ethics, design, intelligence, instinct, vision and collaboration between what is human and what is digital, and also a digital environment that is transformed into reality as we transition from conceptualising content, namely the collections for the next S/S 2025 season, to the actual making of fabrics and accessories.

MU PLUS presents three creative focal points, grouped into different product areas: 3 macro-environments where collections are displayed according to the similarities between ideas, materials, workmanship and colours, to provide more creative ideas to exhibitors and visitors, and to raise the profile of specific product categories.

MU+ REGENERATION: KNITWEAR + EMBROIDERY + LINGERIE

MU+ DESIGN: CLASSIC + SHIRTS + PRINTS

MU+ INTERACTIVE: TECNO + GLAM + SHINY

Applying AI to responsible creativity will lead to new opportunities for inspiration and suggest innovative solutions to optimise planning processes and design quality, focusing on reducing the environmental footprint, reducing waste and fostering the reuse and recycling of materials, becoming more sustainable and innovative.

MU+ REGENERATION 

This theme identifies 3 categories within a vision of fashion that is regenerated both in terms of material and through the use of AI.

Exploring ways to use materials that can be grown and/or produced in a regenerative way reduces environmental impact. By selecting raw materials such as cotton, wool, silk, hemp or synthetic fabrics, such as nylon and polyester for example, whose regeneration can extend the lifespan of existing textiles, reduces reliance on virgin materials and thus reduces waste.

Colours are featured as a sophisticated and timeless palette of milky hues, creamy white, dusty pink, wax yellow and mineral grey, jazzed up by luscious pink and coral pink, warmed up by red/burgundy and embellished with platinum.

Knitted macro knits converge in KNITWEAR where three-dimensionality and the alternating interplay of solids and voids are predominant, alongside reworked knitted fabrics combined with embossed work; for accessories, textures abound in knitted macro covered buttons and crocheted buckles and macro snaps with regenerated yarns.

EMBROIDERY brings together all kinds of lace and embroidery, also overlaid, regenerated and emphasising sustainability; for accessories, embroidered labels, macramé frog fasteners and big cotton ruffles are assembled here.

Light, transparent fabrics such as chiffon and tulle - also used as tag fabric - are part of the LINGERIE world, together with corsets with boning, textured organza and pleated taffeta. Accessories include stretch tapes, assorted small accessories for lingerie and transparent nylon zippers.

MU+ DESIGN 

This theme reveals 3 categories with a precise stylistic vision in which AI has been used to elevate style into something more dreamlike in the first case, graphic in the second and picturesque in the third.

The combination of different styles, with a mix of references from different eras and even opposing cultures, can produce unique aesthetics, diverse and therefore also “cool”, portraying a wide range of influences through AI.

Experimentation with shapes, fabrics, accessories, colours, art and visuals can become essential to achieve a fusion of style and design, leading to innovative, sustainable and original creations.

Utilising pastel shades, colours convey a graphic vibe with sky blue and leaf green and with neutral bases such as wheat and pistachio, enhanced by deep red, bright yellow and tempered by ash grey and ochre.

In CLASSIC, where the mood is “new office revised”, high-performing fabrics such as cool wool and stretch cotton and light coated wools combined with pastel-coloured linings are brought together. Accessories are also infused with coatings and enamel details, such as tone-on-tone coated zippers, enamelled snap fasteners, snaps, new frog fasteners and tone-on-tone inner trouser waistbands.

SHIRTS carry the day with stripes in a myriad of variations, including on buttons and inner trouser waistbands.

The prints of the PRINTS universe are macro and look towards art for splashes of colour or tempera/pastel effects, alongside maximalist geometric patterns. Standouts among the accessories are buttons and ribbons with man-made spots and tinted macro bubble effect labels.

MU+ INTERACTIVE 

This theme identifies 3 concepts with a dual approach to fashion: first, the technical and performance characteristics of the fabrics are emphasised, and second, the glamorous and purely aesthetic aspect.

Experimentation made it possible to transform activewear into a glamorous, extremely feminine, ballroom style, indeed as sexy evening wear, resulting in fabrics and accessories that not only have a fashionable edge, but also a comfortable fit, typical of athleisure wear, striking a balance between practicality and fashion.

Colours are clearly portrayed by bright, pigmented tones of pomegranate red, turmeric orange and sapphire blue, either in colour block versions or as soft accents and nuances, accentuated by copper and silver laminated details. Colour contrasts make a statement to reveal dark incandescent brown shadows, camouflage green and black.

TECNO features technical scuba-like fabrics or metallic prints, technical jersey alongside fabrics - also lingerie - that mimic the look of leather, in matt or grained versions. Even the accessories are technical, such as metal fasteners with polyurethane trim, metal studs and labels made of regenerated materials, zippers and coated tapes.

The common denominator for GLAM is the wow effect created by puffed, embroidered and laminated fabrics, long fringed fabrics, stitched recycled fabrics, metallic netting and round eyelets and pebble-effect micro-button fabrics. Accessories also feature salvaged and reinterpreted materials and netting, studded or encased in recycled polyurethane.

Brightness and shimmering metallic effects are the hallmarks of the SHINY world, which brings together fabrics with sequins, whether real or recreated in jersey using shiny threads, laminations and metallic finishes. Studs and rhinestones are the focal point of the accessories, as are nettings embellished with stone and crystal appliqués

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