We shall not cease from exploration, and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time – T.S. Eliot

 To embark on a journey, one does not need to cross the Seven Seas, but explore the surroundings with keen eyes and imagination. For his Spring / Summer 2017 collection, Alessandro Michele pays homage to the traveller, an individual that goes through different layers of reality, reading even the hidden signs, to collect as many existences and stories as possible. Traveller par excellellence, Michele weaves this fragments together, saving them from the wave of oblivion, and gives shapes to an heclectic range of garments that blends sea uniforms and pirate-inspired elements with contemporary suggestions. Behind each suit there is a process of knowledge that aims to keep trace of the otherness. Imaginary voyages cross with actual journeys, real and unreal temporalities are embodied by the clothes, that poetically represent memories and dreams combined and reassembled together to create new meanings. Sailors of the world, the Gucci crew embraces the unexpected encounters that the journey implies, falling for the excitement of new discoveries. As every ship they eventually come back to the harbour, following the circular nature of the journey. Enriched with new experiences and decked up in folk costumes, with the pockets and the heart full of souvenirs form the faraway lands, they look at the past with bittersweet nostalgia while keeping an eye on the future.