Where Fashion Meets Architecture: Plum's Mirror series

Take a look at Alda Fendi's collaboration with Jean Nouvel

November 13, 2023~

Milan might be famous as the centre of Italian fashion, but Rome isn’t far behind. Among the foremost Roman houses is Fendi, founded in 1925 and perhaps best known during Karl Lagerfeld’s stint as creative director. Alda Fendi, one of the five daughters that took over the label in the mid-twentieth century recently opened a new headquarters of her art foundation, which, alongside a high-end restaurant and a gallery, hosts a handful of apartments. An installation in the palazzo

The project was a joint effort between Alda Fendi and Jean Nouvel, the Pritzker Prize-winning architect behind the Institut du Monde Arabe and the Musée du Quai Branly. The building itself is spectacular. In renovating a derelict palazzo, rather than starting something from scratch, Fendi and Nouvel show an appreciation for the history of the city, particularly important given the foundation’s location, overlooking the ruins of the Forums._

The juxtaposition of old and new is especially prominent in the apartments. Original plaster is left pockmarked, and screens depicting the state of the building pre-renovation act like windows into the past. At the same time, the stainless steel and the gaudy, Koons-esque furniture brings us storming into the present, or some sugar-rush, hyper-realised version of it.Mirror Sand

There are twenty-four apartments in total, each different from the last. We have all of them on Plum, but we wanted to take the time to show off Mirror Sand, which is our personal favourite.Mirror Sand

Want to see the Mirror series in full? Here’s the whole set.

Written by James Freeman

James works with Plum's Italian collection. He studied the country's cuisine, and is something of a pasta expert. He knows his cavatappi from his cavatelli, but he loves all shapes equally (apart from penne, whose inner void is too nihilistic for his taste).