When Demna Gvasalia, then-Balenciaga creative director, was announced as Gucci’s new creative lead in March, shocking fashion industry folks and spooking investors, as indicated by the closely-timed drop in value of the share price of Gucci and Balenciaga-owner Kering. Known for a $2,000 IKEA-inspired bag and uber-controversial ad campaigns that landed Balenciaga in scalding-hot-water, Demna seemed an odd fit for Gucci, a 104-year-old brand with what commentators called a “deeper heritage [that] necessitate[s] a more refined approach.”
But is that really true? Attempts to reposition Gucci as a heritage-driven luxury brand seem to have faltered as of late. While market conditions have undoubtedly played a role, part of the downturn may lie in former creative director Sabato De Sarno’s designs and the brand’s luxury pivot – some of which raised fashion law issues due to limited legal protection. The Cruise 2026 collection suggests a shift: Gucci is pulling from the fashion law playbook, potentially setting the stage for a more “fashion” oriented Gucci aesthetic, one that had success under earlier creative head Alessandro Michele.
Even more interesting? Gucci CEO Stefano Cantino told Vogue that “from afar, Gucci’s incoming artistic director Demna was … fully aware of [the Cruise Collection’s] development,” though not yet formally in charge. While technically a studio team collection, Demna’s Gucci may already be emerging, subtly embedded in this archive-inspired lineup.
The fashion law moves in Gucci Cruise 2026 highlight shapes and designs from the archive that have long been in use by the brand but can be easily molded and made part of designs that hit the cultural zeitgeist today. The brand is, in other words, highlighting trademarks (or symbols that may be eligible for trademark protection) in new design contexts linked to contemporary fashion choices. Consider the Square G, registered in 2023 for clothing and used here as a belt buckle and the basis for a new G shape – possibly referencing a paper clip in the jewelry collection, rumored to involve Pomellato.
Luxury, as Stefania Saviolo and Erica Corbellini note, is defined by timelessness. De Sarno’s use of Gucci Rosso Ancora (an oxblood-like hue) across the brand – down to Milan’s trams – felt like a luxury move. The New York Times credited De Sarno’s Spring 2024 collection for sparking a burgundy trend, but without secondary meaning, a zeitgeist event like Barbie, or a Pantone contract, Gucci had limited ability to control the spread or truly capitalize on it.
Despite its heritage link to Guccio Gucci’s time at the Savoy, De Sarno’s use of oxblood red, alone, was not a strong enough luxury proposition – especially when some Gucci ballet flats closely resembled Ferragamo’s.
In contrast to De Sarno’s choice of a functional color without secondary meaning, Gucci Cruise 2026 went back to symbols and house codes firmly in trademark, making relatively small tweaks. The “paper clip” G is one example, but consider the Guccissimo pattern, that plethora of interlocking GGs connected by dots. Registered as a trademark in 2012, the mark’s categories of goods include footwear and gloves. And now stockings, and leggings? In some ways Guccissimo takes us to a total look aesthetic defined by a pattern that mirrors what Demna did at Balenciaga, albeit with florals.
The Gucci Cruise 2026 total look also, however, has beige at its center (a color that is, itself, at the heart of a current IP debate), which contrasts De Sarno’s era and instead, echoed Frida Giannini’s direction post-Tom Ford. Giannini leaned into heritage, launching the Gucci Museo while omitting Tom Ford and emphasizing logomania and themes like travel and sport. This institution focused on brand symbols, not designers – making it more trademark than copyright-driven. She also emphasized timeless icons rather than reimagining them.
At the same time, that trademark institution, under Giannini’s leadership, was firmly in the luxury space and not fashion. It sought to provide timeless icons of Gucci’s heritage instead of playing with them or even breaking them for audiences today, as Michele did by bombarding the Flora with oversized insects and serpents.
What Gucci’s Heritage Really Is
This leads to a fundamental observation about Gucci’s heritage that is perhaps overlooked in the commentary about Demna’s fit and what he will design in the future. Gucci’s heritage is about chaos, creative differences, and fashion, not just luxury, no matter how much Kering might wish to try to reposition the brand. The chaos of fashion is visible in everything from Gucci’s family origins to the battle for the Gucci Group in the 1990s. The brand is a hybrid entity that needs fashion as much as the more timeless codes it may emphasize to consumers.
Indeed, we might divide Gucci’s creative direction into two heritage or archival camps: those who emphasize timeless codes (Giannini, De Sarno) and those who mold heritage into fashion (Ford, Michele). Michele succeeded by re-mixing heritage with a bohemian twist, while Ford drew from equestrian motifs, bamboo handles, and GG marks.
The Gucci Cruise 2026 show, with its “paper clip” G, Dionysus-like clasp bags, Guccissimo patterns on stockings, Bamboo pendants, horsebit bags, and Dapper Dan shoulders, seems to set Demna up for membership in the Michele/Ford camp. There were also plenty of translations of other objects from the archive – can anyone say archival ashtray inspired earrings? Or even, closer to our Kardashian-era, a Khy-inspired fur coat?
Gucci works best in full fashion mode – challenging norms, breaking icons, and creating new ones. Cruise 2026 uses the archive to expand Gucci’s IP portfolio. For every iconic Bamboo that gains distinctiveness over time, there is a “paper clip” G or Gucci Ghost collab that adds originality to Gucci’s legal toolkit. Demna seems aligned with this vision. Gucci’s retreat from heavy Rosso Ancora marketing – see the rebranding of its athletic shoe email to “Color in Every Step” – supports that. Meanwhile, the Flora print remains a campaign focus (e.g., The Art of Silk event in Paris) but was absent from Cruise 2026.
In What Camp Will Demna Fall?
And this brings us to Demna, and what Gucci design camp he might fall into. We might bet on the Tom Ford/Alessandro Michele camp for a few reasons. Even before Gucci Cruise 2026, Gucci moved away from an overt marketing of Gucci Rosso Ancora, despite the inventory it still has in the color. Consider this recent marketing email, which rebrands Gucci Rosso Ancora (at least as applied to athletic shoes) to “Color in Every Step.”
Demna’s past archive work at Balenciaga offers clues. Before his Fall 2016 debut, he spent months researching Cristóbal Balenciaga’s essence for modern relevance, reimagining even generic garments. Folk-inspired floral dresses reflected both Balenciaga and Demna’s original label, Vetements.
By Fall 2017, Vogue dubbed Demna’s Balenciaga “Spandex meets the Tom Ford era.” His red-carpet designs – ranging from masked looks to elegant gowns – blend archival nods with his vision. His fondness for oversized accessories may find a home in Gucci’s archive, which holds shapes ripe for reinterpretation (and maybe design patent protection). Accessories show Demna’s ready-made talent. His IKEA bag – now seen as a reverse dupe – suggests future projects might reimagine Italian everyday items.
Could the Esselunga shopper be next? Cruise 2026 already draws from Florentine signora style, rooted in the residential Santo Spirito area.
And still, Demna’s aesthetic, which he calls “vicious … Gothic,” blends streetwear and irony. He could channel alternativo fashion from the streets of Naples or Milan into Gucci’s runways. Demna’s penchant for appropriating ordinary things could find its way from the streets of Italy to Gucci’s runways. Gucci Cruise 2026 already seemed to gather inspiration from the idea of a Florentine signora and take her to the streets, at least in the very residential area of Santo Spirito.
Fashion and Fashion Law
As Demna creates Gucci ready-mades, the lack of distinctiveness and functionality of many designs on the street might help his fashion vision and build alternative fashion narratives to shape consumers’ conversations and attraction to Demna’s Gucci. That is one thing, after all, that the archive provides in abundance more than design inspiration: a narrative of authenticity.
In hindsight, it is always easier to divide a brand’s collections into distinct eras. Michele did work as accessories director under Giannini, and much of De Sarno’s vision for Gucci Rosso Ancora may have been the result of his own work at Valentino under Pier Paolo Piccioli’s direction. The narrative arc that might shape Demna’s Gucci might not be so linear. In many senses, this is what analyzing a brand’s heritage is all about: trying to parse what fashion from the past can, when re-mixed by a new Creative Director, match today’s consumer interest. We saw this in the Gucci Cruise 2026 show.
In the brand’s words, archival pieces were “Left as it was. Felt as it is.” The Gucci Archive offers “traces of a living history.” The latest Gucci Giglio bag seeks to capitalize on that history, using a very liberal (and non-trademarkable) interpretation of the shape from the lily, a sign of the city of Florence.
But the thing to remember about the very DNA of Gucci is that fashion, in all its chaos and creativity, is at the heart of the brand, not just luxury. In this author’s opinion Demna’s success will depend on fashion and luxury, and the timely legal rights and extra-legal norms in designs, marks, and expressions that a combination of fashion sprinkled with luxury can bring. The archive can certainly provide inspiration and a foundation, but we need more “paper clip” Gs. We will see how Demna breaks Gucci’s icons and makes new ones – investors (and in house counsels) might just be pleasantly surprised.
Felicia Caponigri is a Visiting Scholar at Chicago-Kent College of Law and the Founder of Fashion by Felicia. She hosts A Fashion Law Dinner Party, a podcast exploring design, heritage, and the law with fashion industry guests.
Share
