For its newest ‘La Vacanza’ collection, Versace draws inspiration from its ‘oceanic roots,’ delving into the mythology of the Mediterranean. The collection includes pieces that easily shift from beachwear to casual attire and other versatile styles, each featuring unique iterations of the iconic Tresors de la Mer pattern.

Models Abby Champion and Peter Van Noord front the Versace La Vacanza 2025 Campaign, shot by Zoë Ghertner [IG]. / Hair by Tamara McNaughton; makeup by Dick Page

Luxury brand Versace has always acknowledged its inspiration from Mediterranean mythology, particularly Greek mythology, as evidenced by its iconic Medusa logo.

Gianni Versace, a founder brother to Donatella Versace, chose the Medusa head for the logo, inspired by a childhood memory. Gianni remembered seeing the Medusa embedded in the floor of ruins in the area of Reggio Calabria, where the Versace siblings played in as children.

Versace's use of this figure in the logo reflected his desire to create a brand that is both visually luxurious and bold, but also one embedded in antiquity. AOC has always believed that Gianni Versace embodied a sophisticated and nuanced understanding of contemporary female psychology and women’s history.

Donatella Versace carried that understanding forward to present times, when Prada Group has agreed to buy the Versace brand from Capri Holdings for an estimated $1.38 billion, including Versace’s debt.

Prada Group is known for its expertise in telling women’s stories, and Versace is a diamond-field of women’s history that can rival Dior’s. And while Maria Grazia Chiuria isn’t leaving Dior quite as quickly as chatty tongues have claimed, Dior is not a powerful woman’s brand in its DNA. Versace is.

AOC is publicly nervous about what happens to all the women’s history credentials Chiuri has brought to Dior — at this critical moment in time for women worldwide. Her outreach to women artisans globally has been truly inspiring.

Versace is different. Forget the fact that Miuccia Prada was a flaming red, card-carrying feminist back in the day. The Prada group purchase of Versace has thousands of years of human history ready to tell women’s stories of the patriarchal determination to control our sexuality and bodies to negating our value as thinking beings running businesses.

We also cannot negate the question of how Dario Vitale, Versace’s new creative design vision, feels about Medusa and her posse. One assumes that after working with Mrs P since 2010 and being a quiet star in creating Miu Miu’s success, that Vitale has gotten the message.

Versace’s Medusa is a figure of beauty and simultaneously a destructive menace. Today AOC adds Medusa as an empathetic and tragic figure — if not to men, most assuredly to educated women.

Ovid's version portrays Medusa as a beautiful priestess of Athena who was raped by Poseidon in the goddess's temple. Did Athena stand up for Medusa? Hardly. Athena punished her for not properly defending her temple. The whole story sounds like an honor killing to me — and at the hands of another goddess.

Does AOC have a beef with Athena? Indeed we do.

The collection’s sea-centric motifs are symbols of Versace’s commitment to the preservation of ocean treasures, an initiative by Versace to protect all aspects of diversity, including biodiversity.

For the La Vacanza campaign, the House collaborates with Coral Gardeners – an organisation which restores damaged reefs – and their commitment to adopting nine thousand coral fragments in French Polynesia.

The question today is whether Versace can spread its wings as a global, badass, glamorous Italian brand, while Prada has their backs. The DNA seems ripe for exploitation and renewal, and if any cast of characters knows how to mine Versace’s precious identity, it’s this one. Fingers crossed. ~ Anne