Dolce & Gabbana Ad Provokes Public Outrage in China

Once the last of the 210 or so looks in this Alta Moda collection had retreated backstage—the finale alone took seven minutes—Domenico Dolce stood in the mirrored hall of Palazzo Litta, in Milan, to address the elephant in this beautiful room.



He told journalists: “China is yesterday. Today is another day . . . I know life can surprise you, in the good way and in the bad way. But not all days are roses. Sometimes when we have the worst day—and I am 60 years old now—I think sometimes that life, it wants to teach us something. You have to open the eyes, and open the heart, and you try and understand what life wants to tell you. And you try to understand. And the day after, you go on.”



Not quite yesterday, but 17 days after the cancellation of its ready-to-wear show in Shanghai and 15 days after its filmed apology for the offense given to China and its citizens, Dolce & Gabbana today swerved from recent history to history relatively ancient. The subject of this collection of one-of-a-kind womenswear and menswear—much of which had already been purchased by the time the aftershow lunch was over by an audience of clients hailing from the United States, India, Russia, Canada, Angola, Germany, Singapore, Japan, and, perhaps surprisingly, mainland China—was more than 500 years old, conceived by the designers early this year, and yet seemed in many ways perfectly pertinent to now.