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Dean and Dan Caten are the jokers in the pack of Milanese fashion: DSquared2's chic is always tongue in cheek. Take the show notes for their collections - generally pre-doodled, written in rhyming slang and not really telling very much about the collection at all. For S/S 2011, we had references to Nancy Drew and 'Playin' dress up with Scooby-Doo' - which maybe underscored the geek-chic of sending just about every model out in oversized Terry Richardson-style spectacles.
That, however, was about the only gag in this collection, which otherwise showed the DSquared2 boys on very best behaviour. Maybe those specs were showing the boys' studious side, and there was a feel of Ralph Lauren-ish east coast prep to boxy school blazers, cardigans and chino skirts. A bit of glitter came out, granted, in a slightly sixties plaid skirt or on flesh satin twinned with grey jersey melange sweatshirts, but otherwise the look was casual and basic. In hindsight, the shoes said it all - rather than the towering DSquared2 stripper heels of yore, they were flat brogues worn with frilled bobby-socks.
All very restrained, and quite chic - those WASP staples of khaki trench, navy blazers and neat button-down shirt looked neat-as-a-pin, and a healthy dose of black-and-white gave eveningwear a mod sixties spin. But where was the hot, sultry and - lets just say it - slutty sexuality the DSquared2 woman loves so much? Bar a few flesh-coloured swimsuits so brief they resembled tan-lines rather than actual garments, it was absent this season. And when the actual garments are as everyday as these, putting off the glitz left something decidedly lacking.