Alessandro Michele: his new book

That Alessandro Michele that he had a writer’s verve was already evident from his show notes in the Gucci era, sometimes long enough to fill entire pages, and a soup of terms drawn from the most academic philosophical vocabulary available. It is therefore no surprise that Michele, who is now at the helm of Valentino, has co-authored a book with the philosopher. Emanuele Cocciatitled The life of the form. Filosofia del reincanto and published by HarperCollins, which will be released on May 7 and will explore the complex relationship between individuals, objects and images, revealing truths often hidden beneath the surface of everyday experiences. The project was announced in 2022 after a series of lectures by Coccia about Michele himself; it was supposed to be released last year, but Michele’s work situation certainly delayed its publication.

Considering Michele’s career, the book should be discussed, following HarperCollins’ announcement two years ago: “how two forms of creativity and human knowledge that have traditionally been separated, philosophy and fashion, are in fact inextricably linked: if fashion can explode centuries of art and knowledge into a daily experience inherent to every human being, philosophy cannot help but itself a form of fashion.” You can tell from the cover and the title an aesthetic that is indebted to nineteenth-century publishing; an example shared by Coccia notes that the book uses “chapters” instead of the term the poetic term “strophes”while according to some anonymous sources the book could have a graphic layout inspired by church books marginal gloss instead of footnotes and also calligramssomewhat related to Robert Greene’s 1998 cult book, The 48 laws of power.