FMC #02

07.06 / Dua Lipa at I-Days, Milano 
At the SNAI La Maura Hippodrome for the concert of the Pop diva, loved by the greatest fashion designers and undisputed protagonist of the post-pandemic music scene.

11–14.06 / NOVA ROCK (Pannonia Fields, Nickelsdorf – AT)
Four days surrounded by the myths of the music world — Slipknot, Korn, Linkin Park, and
Electric Callboy — at one of Europe’s largest rock events. FMC joins the communities.

16.06 / FASHION HERITAGE ACADEMY Open Day (Turin)
Starting at 5:30 PM at the Piero della Francesca Center, meet the coordinators and
instructors of the new Academy. FMC invites you to explore today’s and tomorrow’s fashion
professions.
Register to participate here

17.06 / GLEAM – Workshop #2 at the National Cinema Museum (Turin)
A co-design and testing day with blind and visually impaired users, in collaboration with the
National Cinema Museum, Tactile Vision, and UIC — exploring cinema through sound and
(video)games.
The GLEAM project has indirectly received funding from the European Union’s Horizon Europe research and innovation action programme, via the XR4ED – Open Call issued and executed under the XR4ED project (Grant Agreement no. 101093159).

01-03.07 / Fashion Heritage Academy @ B2B Torino Fashion Match
With the talk “The Heritage of Tailoring: How to Preserve an Art”, during Turin Fashion Week, Fabrizio Modina, President of Fondazione M-Cube, will highlight the urgent need to safeguard the human and cultural heritage of Italian tailoring. In collaboration with Unioncamere Piemonte.

10.07 / Kylie Minogue – The Tension Tour
Live from Lyon, France, we’ll attend the concert of the Pop Princess — one of the most influential figures in music since the 1980s. The Australian star is a muse to fashion designers like Jean Paul Gaultier and Dolce & Gabbana, and her shows are a dazzling mix of technology and theatricality.

In May, our fashion conversations often landed on the MET Gala in New York, on Anna Wintour and Vogue. We talked about Sabrina Carpenter in her Louis Vuitton look, and Rihanna, who announced her pregnancy on the carpet in a Marc Jacobs gown. We dreamed of Bella Hadid, Kaia Gerber, Lucky Blue Smith, and Alton Mason.
We shared catwalks, covers, and… again and again… the longing many of us feel for a size 38–40 (IT) and a sculpted body.

Other conversations focused on the experiences lived at the MART in Rovereto with Oriente Occidente and at Sight City in Frankfurt, together with blind and visually impaired communities: we talked about Ray Charles and Stevie Wonder, about Al Pacino in Scent of a Woman (1992) and Björk in Dancer in the Dark (2000), but also about Lucy Edwards, a blind British model and activist, the first to walk the runway at Copenhagen Fashion Week.
We asked those who are blind: How do you shop for clothes? How do you choose what to wear?

When we talk about fashion, our perspective is often one-directional in terms of space and time – but the world we live in is not.
Our era is made up of many different bodies, all seeking beauty – or rather, the ability to attract relationships, of any kind, with other living beings.

The MET Gala itself opens this space-time window, with the theme “Superfine: Tailoring Black Style”—inspired by the concept of Black dandyism—exploring how style and clothing have contributed to shaping Black identity throughout the Atlantic diaspora, from the 18th century to today.

Bodies across different ethnicities vary enormously, just as the concept of beauty does: soft and abundant shapes, lean and towering figures, petite and delicate frames like porcelain dolls, natural or sculpted musculature on display, long necks and slender hands, hips and backsides seemingly born to dance, skins that cover the full spectrum of the rainbow, with gradients from milky white to a black that blends with the night.

While models like Adut Akech (South Sudan/Australia), Halima Aden (Somalia/USA), and Paloma Elsesser (USA) are bringing more diversity to the runways, and some ad campaigns now include people of all ages, shapes, and ethnic backgrounds (e.g., Rihanna’s Fenty Beauty), and more brands are expanding their size ranges to include plus, petite, and tall options, it remains a challenge to truly imagine all possible body shapes and the complexity of designing garments that can honor our diverse identities.

This challenge also applies to bodies that fall outside of standard sizing for other reasons: diet, illness, lifestyle rhythms, or personal fears all influence our bodies and our appearance. In a global society swinging between high rates of both anorexia and obesity, between bodies that have undergone surgery and transformation, the question remains: how can fashion help create a positive offering and message—one that could truly be a game changer?

And beyond sizes, in our everyday lives we encounter scars, tattoos, vitiligo—bodies that carry incredible stories. In Corpi dipinti,, Matt Lodder introduces us to humanity through 21 tattoos. “By observing the marks that humans have etched onto their skin,” he explains, “we can understand people, places, and historical moments. The body is a blank canvas we’ve learned to paint on, carve into, color—making it a bearer of messages and a witness to our earthly existence.
The urgency to communicate through signs is a fundamental human trait, and few art forms have the immediacy and intimacy of a tattoo.”

Necklines, cut-outs, sheer fabrics: it is through the bodies of Damiano David, Blanco, Mahmood, Lil Nas X, Harry Styles—but also through all of us, who carry indelible marks traced out of love, loyalty, rebellion, or simple fun—that today’s fashion designers must engage when creating a garment.

The challenge becomes even greater when the body doesn’t appear as we might expect. Bodies with disabilities have long elicited fear and horror, fueling phobias and prejudices, and still today evoke conflicting emotions, sometimes leaving us awkward in how we relate and connect with those perceived as “outside the norm” or “missing something.” In 2019, to celebrate Barbie’s 60th anniversary, Mattel dedicated a doll (in sporty, elegant, and casual versions) to Bebe Vio, Paralympic fencing champion, as part of the “Shero” project—a move to break barriers and stereotypes and to inspire future generations. Far from hiding her prosthetics, Bebe appeared on the cover of Vanity Fair alongside Federica Pellegrini, in a visionary shot by artist Maurizio Cattelan. She walked the runway at Milan Fashion Week wearing knee-high pink boots decorated with the face of Jigglypuff, a Pokémon character, and graced the Cannes Film Festival red carpet in dresses designed by Dior to highlight her prosthetics and celebrate authentic beauty and inclusivity.

The blind and visually impaired young people we meet at the MART in Rovereto and at Sight City in Frankfurt—through workshops organized by the M-Cube Foundation to develop inclusive products and services – are invited to explore a range of fabrics through touch and smell, and to listen to the stories behind them, like that of denim. They are also encouraged to design garments and define their features and details – elements that will help them recognize their own clothes in the wardrobe and fall in love with them, even if they cannot see them.

At the same time, we find ourselves in conversation in Berlin with one of the most vibrant and fascinating Queer communities, which opens up another important topic. We attend events where international body positive and body neutrality movements promote the acceptance of all body types without rigid aesthetic standards. Their idea of the “body as home” helps us better understand how the body is not just a physical shell, but the primary site of experience, identity, and relationships with the world. These are transformed bodies, bodies in flux, sometimes simply dressed or narrated differently.

Today’s designers are called to engage with cultural and social constructs more than with fixed biological realities—with a ritual that requires time and care, rather than just a routine. The way a queer person dresses, wears makeup, or styles their hair follows no fixed rules: it is a personal, political, and artistic expression manifested through a multitude of practices.

From this have emerged the logics and trends of drag culture—as parody, celebration, or exaggeration of gender—but also genderless/agender fashion, camp and theatricality à la Susan Sontag, and styles such as punk, rave, club kid, gothic, ‘90s, or Y2K.

And finally, we land in the Metaverses and video games, because the M-Cube Foundation is currently developing three of them. Here, fashion dresses immaterial, multiform bodies—constantly evolving and undergoing metamorphosis. Bradley Quinn, in his book Fashion in the Metaverse, helps us better understand the present moment—between augmented, virtual, and mixed reality, AI, and blockchain—where technological innovations are inspiring designers, brands, and consumers to think beyond conventional clothing in the physical world and to create new relationships with digital garments within 3D virtual spaces. In this realm, where new professions are taking shape, the fashion artist has a secured place.

We still have much to learn, and the landscape ahead is certainly challenging, but these are the many expressions of fashion that, together with the M-Cube Foundation, we aim to explore and bring to life through the Fashion Heritage Academy.

The M-Cube Foundation launches the Fashion Heritage Academy with three two-year professional training courses, each totaling 2,600 hours. Students will have the opportunity to become professionals in Haute Couture, costume designers for theatre, cinema, and the incredible and ever-growing cosplay market, as well as fashion artists specializing in creations for the Metaverse and video games.

The Fashion Heritage Academy operates through key national and international networks. By joining us, you’ll have the chance to experiment in innovation labs and take part in professional internships, thanks to our partnerships with companies that are actively seeking exactly the kind of new professional profiles we train at FHA.

You’ll have the chance to practice English in the fashion industry, gain a deeper understanding of what it means to design for real bodies, and explore new professional perspectives. You’ll learn to bridge cultures—between East and West, between generations, aesthetics, and what is often perceived as disability.

You’ll have the opportunity to practice English in the fashion industry, gain a deeper understanding of what it means to design for diverse bodies, and open up to new professional perspectives—crossing cultures (East and West), generations, aesthetics, and even what is commonly perceived as disability. It’s a journey through fashion that embraces inclusion, innovation, and cultural dialogue.

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SAVE THE DATE

Join Us on June 16th at 5:30 PM in Turin – Discover the World of the Fashion Heritage Academy!
📍 Corso Svizzera 185bis, Turin (Italy)
You’re invited to our Open Day at the Fashion Heritage Academy
This will be a unique opportunity to dive into the world of Haute Couture, explore the art of cosplay, and discover the cutting-edge frontier of digital fashion.
Come and meet our instructors, learn more about the exciting courses we offer.

🎟️ Sign up now and get ready to step into the future of fashion!

Our journey through the screens continues! In this second installment, we shine the spotlight on one of the most talked-about releases of the moment, a film that has garnered widespread acclaim, confirming one of the most interesting directors of our time. We’re talking about Queer (2025) by Luca Guadagnino, which premiered in Italian theaters on April 17 and is based on the novel of the same name by William S. Burroughs. With this latest masterpiece, Guadagnino reaffirms the subversive power of his cinema, capable of challenging conventions and dismantling dominant narratives by using beauty as a battleground between repression and liberation.

At first glance, a story of unrequited love between two lonely souls, Queer is actually much more. As Guadagnino himself states, it is “the story of an impossibility within possibility,” of a deep longing for connection and tenderness, and the repression of that very desire out of fear of recognizing oneself in something unknown and therefore frightening.
With Queer, we are thrown into a rundown Mexico City, a murky territory where clothing becomes the battleground for unstable identities and unconfessable desires. Queer invites us to reflect on how, once again, cinema uses fashion not merely as decoration to evoke an imagery but as a true language to tell stories of inner decay, ambiguity, and the unsaid.

On this occasion, Luca Guadagnino creates a work that both seduces and unsettles, and not only because of the power of the story. The film weaves period aesthetics with a touch of surrealism, shaping a vision halfway between dream and reality, tradition and modernity. Set in the 1950s, it takes place during the height of the American boom, which gave rise to a modern and mass-produced men’s wardrobe rooted in European tailoring traditions. Bringing this vision to life in the costumes is Jonathan Anderson (British designer, founder of the brand JW Anderson, former creative director of Loewe, and current creative director of Dior Homme), who had previously collaborated with the director on Challengers (2024).
While in Challengers the designer aimed to recreate the tennis imagery where brand display is fundamental, in Queer Anderson takes on the challenge of reconstructing an authentic wardrobe from those years, where every fold, fabric, and color becomes part of a larger narrative, where the surface reflects the hidden turmoil.

Symbolic indeed is Lee’s cream-colored linen suit (played by Daniel Craig), which gradually becomes wrinkled and stained, visually narrating the character’s descent into the abyss of drug addiction. Similarly, the shirt—pure white like cocaine—becomes dirtied and darkened throughout the film as the protagonist falls deeper into heroin. Meanwhile, the beloved and elusive Eugene (played by Drew Starkey) floats lightly in airy shirts, fine knitwear, and wide trousers that keep him always just out of reach, a symbol of unattainable desire.
“I wanna talk to you without speaking,” says Lee. We don’t know if he succeeds, but in Queer, the image certainly speaks louder than anything else, thanks also to the hand of cinematographer Sayombhu Mukdeeprom.

Already known for having handled the cinematography of much of Guadagnino’s filmography, Mukdeeprom is an artist capable of turning every shot into a painting that breathes on its own. Every scene becomes a pictorial fragment suspended between the real and the dreamlike: the sweat on the skin, the wrinkled fabrics, the shadows that consume faces. Everything speaks, everything builds a sensory imaginary that drags us into the abyss alongside the protagonists.
The film reminds us that the real scandal is not the naked body, but the soul that lets itself be glimpsed. It is there, in that exposed vulnerability, that Queer finds its disruptive strength. And it does so with an aesthetic that seduces and destabilizes at the same time, capable of attracting the gaze only to then tear it away, leaving us disoriented and, perhaps, a little changed. At the end of the viewing, there remains the sensation of having crossed a feverish dream where nothing is as it seems and everything tells a deeper truth.

SUPERHEROES – FROM ANTIQUITY TO CONTEMPORARY
Inaugurated on May 29th at the Vapriikki Museokeskus Centre in Tampere, Finland, the new exhibition curated by Fabrizio Modina for Fondazione M-Cube, Federica Montani, and Eugenio Martera for Contemporanea Progetti. It is a hyperdynamic and super-pop journey through the history of heroes from the past and present. The exhibition explores the types of superhero models found in ancient myths and legends. Visitors can follow the evolution of superheroes both chronologically and thematically.

GLEAM, workshops in blind-mode in Rovereto and Frankfurt
The development of the GLEAM project continues — Game to Learn and Enable Accessibility through Modern Mythology (XR4ED platform) — through co-design and testing workshops with schools and a target group of blind and visually impaired users. The activity in Rovereto on May 6th involved more than 30 people in an experience where even sighted participants put themselves in the shoes of those who cannot use sight to access the tactile visit of a selection of artworks presented by MART, as well as the fabrics and the app in development introduced byFondazione M-Cube and NEEEU GmbH. Participation at Sight City, the world’s largest fair for the blind, held in Frankfurt, also allowed for testing game mechanics with new test groups and engaging with developers and innovators on content, tools, and strategies for inclusion… including in the field of gaming, both physical and virtual.

The GLEAM project has indirectly received funding from the European Union’s Horizon Europe research and innovation action programme, via the XR4ED – Open Call issued and executed under the XR4ED project (Grant Agreement no. 101093159).

SEE THE INVISIBLE, first round results and next steps
In conclusion, the first phase of the See the Invisible project, created by Chiara Masiero Sgrinzatto with Fondazione M-Cube and in collaboration with the New York Institute of Technology. In our world and throughout history, some cities have acquired a powerful mythological charm that has transformed them into “eternal cities,” icons of the past, pride of the present, and simulacra of themselves in the future. The “mythic” cities—and their competitive advantage—can be better understood by wearing a new pair of glasses, capable of revealing the “magic” of the things, events, and stories linked to those places; intangible elements that transcend the limits of time. Between November 2024 and May 2025, New York was the first target city, serving as the base for developing the scientific-artistic investigation format and the AI model. Within the Big Apple—now itself an icon—the project made it possible to represent 12 locations and 4 symbolic elements considered iconic, along with about 30 elements from Modern Mythology (cinema, comics, video games, fashion, sports) that made those places extraordinarily powerful and attractive, to implement and test a phygital model to be applied in the next steps to other “mythic cities.”

RESEARCH
Fondazione M-Cube’s research continues on multiple fronts. Two scientific contributions related to the See the Invisible project have been approved and will be presented between November and December at SiGraDi 2025, the conference on “Meta-Responsive Approaches in Architecture, Art, Design, and Sciences,” in Córdoba (Argentina), and at the GDI 2025 Green + Digital + Intelligent Built Environments event in Auckland (New Zealand). A new short paper and the prototype exhibition “Cities as Emotional-Cognitive Constructs: Panoramic View to Access Myth, Memory, and Meaning” have been submitted for participation in the XXII. Conference Culture and Computer Science – Remixing analog and digital, scheduled for September in Berlin.