ENSEMBLE: The future of fashion fakes the runway in Rome

Rome, 13 July 2026

The first of the two evenings focused on emerging talent, showcasing collections created by students from the Academy of Fine Arts of Frosinone, the Academy of Fine Arts of Rome, Accademia Italiana, Accademia Koefia, Accademia del Lusso, Maiani Fashion Academy, and the National Academy of Tailors. Together, these collections offered a compelling portrait of contemporary fashion education, highlighting diverse design approaches united by a shared commitment to research, quality and innovation.

Within this unique setting, Accademia Italiana presented AIdentities, a project developed by third-year Fashion Design students. The project embarks on a journey through time, exploring cultural heritage, embracing its memory and transforming it through new languages, materials and technologies.

The study of the kimono as a design principle forms the starting point of the project. More than simply a garment, the kimono represents a way of conceiving the relationship between body, form and material. Its construction and its ability to embrace the body without defining it become the shared foundation from which collections emerge that, while maintaining a common visual language, express distinct identities. Rather than referencing Japanese aesthetics as a stylistic quotation, the project engages with them as a way of understanding the relationship between gesture, material and identity.

From this reflection emerge enveloping silhouettes, oversized volumes, reinterpreted obi belts, corsets that interact with the body without constraining it, and more essential forms that coexist in a balance between protection and revelation. Material experimentation becomes the language through which each project takes shape. Natural dyes, textile manipulations, student-developed surfaces, biomaterials, 3D printing and natural crystallization processes applied to fabric expand the expressive possibilities of fashion, transforming material from a simple support for the garment into a narrative and design element.

AIdentities does not seek to represent a single identity, but rather a plurality of perspectives. Each collection interprets the theme through an individual research process while maintaining a shared language grounded in the dialogue between memory, material and innovation. In this way, clothing becomes a medium through which identities, cultures and new perspectives on the present can be expressed.

The project was made possible through the collaboration with Tessitura Taborelli, partner in textile development and experimentation, and Fabric House, which supported the project by providing deadstock fabrics.

The show's sonic dimension was developed in collaboration with the Saint Louis College of Music, through a project involving original music composition, sound design and mixing, conceived to accompany and enhance the narrative of the collection.

During the event, Alessandro Onorato, Councillor for Major Events, Sport, Tourism and Fashion of Roma Capitale, and Roberta Angelilli, Vice President of the Lazio Region and Councillor for Economic Development, Commerce, Craftsmanship, Industry and Internationalization, addressed the audience, reaffirming the strategic importance of fashion education and the fashion supply chain for the development of the city and the region.