Milan street style in the age of digital shows

The physical shows scheduled for this Milano Fashion Week Men's FW21, which began last Friday, 15 and will continue until tomorrow, can be counted on the fingers of one hand. The physical absence of major events to attend has definitely changed the connotations of a city that in times of FW - and of normality - comes alive and is crowded by eclectic figures, well-dressed, avant-garde personalities, to be watched carefully to discover future trends.

The digital format of the event deprives the city and the fashion industry of one of the most important aspects of every Fashion Week, street style. Over the last few seasons, in fact, the real show took place outside the venues chosen for the fashion shows; influencers, trendsetters, insiders were the real protagonists in front of an army of cameras, featured in shots immediately shared on Instagram. A unique way to recognize the most influential personalities in fashion and a means capable of bringing a vast audience closer to a world, that of fashion, often perched in its ivory tower. The brands have partially tried to make up for this lack through the activation of influencers called to post photos with the brand's clothes, reminding their followers of the (online) appointment of the show. Nothing to do with what happened before. 

Due to the health emergency and the introduction of areas with different shades of colour, Milan has, therefore, a different face, silent, submissive, at times sad. That vitality that accompanied the fashion shows of the most important brands on the calendar - many of them absent this year - is lost in the images of the deserted Fondazione Prada, in the photographs of streets and squares completely empty, abandoned to themselves. 

nss magazine, through the shots by Laurent Bentil, has decided to portray a different Fashion Week than usual, a Fashion Week that we hope not to see again for a while.