Valentino previews its Pink PP advertising campaign for fall 2022, fronted by celebritiy friends of the house Zendaya and Sir Lewis Hamilton — who are literally drenched in pink, photographed by Michael Bailey Gates.

“One color, bold, strong, fluid, extravagant, one color to summarize everything I like in fashion and everything that I choose to represent: the liberation from the ordinary, a space to be oneself, a loud symbol for equality and love,” said Valentino’s creative director Pierpaolo Piccioli.

Piccioli stripped the palette to a single hue, an intense shade of pink, identifying it as the color of love, community, energy and freedom. “The idea of Pink as a barrier breaker was born long ago. With my work I must be able to tell and share my values through one single picture and I wanted to apply the same paradigm to one color,” Piccioli explained. “As a consequence it was almost natural to me to look (and find) something that could embrace the need for expression and representation of a new and liberated humanity. I chose Zendaya and Lewis for the PINK PP for the same reason I created this color, beautiful souls that use their voice and talent to unify, integrate, build.”

We do think of Valentino and the color red, but for fall 2022, Pierpaolo Piccioli chose a new Pantone color created by the designer — an intense, magenta Pink PP. The success of the color as a new symbol for the brand was evident at Valentino’s recent couture show in Rome, where guests including Anne Hathaway, Ariana DeBose, Florence Pugh and Ashley Park all wore magenta.

Perfect Timing for Pink Power

Margot Robbie as Barbie. Photo: Jaap Buitendijk / Courtesy of Warner Bros. Pictures

With Margot Robbie bringing us Greta Gerwig’s vision of Barbie in July 2023, the color pink is swinging into high gear. From Elsa Schiaparelli’s signature 1937 intense majenta to the sea of pink hats that launched the 2917 Women’s March global protests against former US president Donald Trump, pink has proven itself to be one of the most controversial colors in the color spectrum.

Note that Washington Post columnist Petula Dvorak begged the Women’s March participants to “back away from the pink.”

It’s true that some of that Women’s March energy seems to have evaporated in the last five years — until the people of Kansas including women, men and all other human variations identifying as Democrats, Repblicans and Independents went to the ballot box on Tuesday to beat back the attempt to delist abortion rights from the Kansas state constitution. Even 20% of Republicans voted to preserve abortion rights in Kansas.

With November elections coming in about 90 days, Americans may once again be pulling out our pussy hats hibernating in dresser drawers. The color may be associated with femininity and womanly humans today, but pink also has a long history as an expression of masculinity, we say pink pussy hats for all.

Stunned by the 59-41 size of the conservative state Kansas abortion vote victory, the energy is huge now, going into the midterms.

Even the Catholic Church, who spent $4 million in Kansas, to overturn the abortion protections in the state constitution and lost the fight, embraces the color rose — not for its nuns but its priests — prescribing the color one Sunday in Advent and also in Lent.

Barbicore, Valentino, pussy hats — pink power is set to live up to its name in the coming year. With his own Pantone color, Pierpaolo Piccioli is a leader for all believers in pink power.