A creek meandering through a pastoral landscape, visible from below the glass floor of an office space became the stage for the Fall / Winter Prada 2024 menswear show, hosted inside the Fondazione Prada in Milan last month. The scenography project was the recent offering of AMO - the research arm of the Dutch architecture studio OMA. Put together within the century-old gin distillery turned arts centre, the studio channelled absurd references to create a utopic backdrop for the display of the Italian luxury fashion house’s new collection titled Human Nature. The fusion of an office interior and a natural landscape demonstrated a paradoxical dichotomy between these co-existing worlds, evocative of our instincts and emotional needs. 

Suspended between the two worlds, the stage is lit in an eerie white glow coming from a sea of pendant LED lamps in the ceiling, in addition to the reflection of the lamps on the floor. Proliferating the space are conventional rotating black office chairs, arranged in curving rows, and offsetting ramp space for models to walk on. A metal grid supports the glass floor of the space, while its pillars meet the elaborate landscaped floor below. Dried leaves are strewn around, rooting for spring; a water feature with mountain pebbles cut through the green blanket; and little pockets of thorny shrubs abstract the garden into an idealised romantic scenery. “As models navigate the sinuous arrangement of office chairs, the viewers are suspended between both worlds to which they undeniably belong,” AMO states.

The studio has maintained a working relationship with Prada for years and continues to obliterate the distinction between ideas and reality, with their scenographies of fashion shows put together as a distinguished art form. From the kinetic design and industrial materiality for F/W 2023 show to the design of interconnected faux-fur sheathed ‘non-spaces’ for the F/W 2021 digital show, AMO’s visions have been altering perception of staging and presentation. With this year’s work too, a synergy of contrasts ensues.

Particular to the presentation is the intervention of a landscaped element within an enclosed setting. The studio refers to it as 'an analogue projection among the many digital images that saturate one’s life today'. Situating the narrative within a workplace—the natural habitat for contemporary humans—an array of contradictions permeates. “In the space of the Deposito an improbable encounter takes place: chaos and order, reality and fiction, predictability and spontaneity—seemingly opposite elements—engage in a game of collaboration,” AMO adds. Within the clinical-looking work atmosphere, the projection of the landscape, in its vast omnipresence yet a seeming quality of being out-of-reach, confronts the space with a sense of utopia. As per AMO, the design took inspiration from the change of seasons and the idea of renewal—themes that have perennially inspired generations of creatives, particularly musicians. “The changing of seasons enables human beings to continue to look at the world with fresh eyes...the seasons have been the most consistent theme in all schools of painting. Fashion aspires to the same effect of renewal,” AMO explains.

Much like the metaphor evident across Samuel Beckett’s magnum opus play Waiting for Godot, human existence is projected with a range of absurdities. It’s immersive and frightening at the same time—the raging duality that clouds our waking hours.