Versace Spring Summer 2016 Collection

Given the winds of maximalism currently sweeping Milan, it came as a surprise that Donatella Versace’s show, held in an “industrial” space rather than the usual palazzo square of Via Gesù, felt a trifle more restrained than usual.

Last season’s crystal hashtag, look-at-me, logo-laden offering was no more – even Donatella, habitually dressed all in black, was wearing a ribbed khaki sweater and khaki trousers at a preview of the collection on Thursday, much to the amusement of the assembly of Italian journalists.

For spring she was inspired, she said, by the notion of an “urban warrior”. Despite the proliferation of camouflage prints, utilitarian khaki, and heavy, tractor-soled boots, urban warrior in Donatella’s dictionary is “absolutely not military”. Instead, it’s “a woman – not a girl” who is “fearless, a fighter, nothing gets her down”. All of which sound like qualities a good soldier should have. But let’s not get hung up on semantics.