Nicola Brognano

Nicola Brognano is an Italian fashion designer whose work has moved between an independent label and the creative direction of established brands. Born in Calabria in 1990, he gained wider industry attention after winning Who Is On Next? in 2015 and developed an eponymous practice before joining Blumarine, where he served as creative director from 2020 to 2023.

At Blumarine, Brognano recast the house’s romantic vocabulary through early-2000s references: low rises, butterfly motifs, fitted knitwear, faux fur, washed denim and deliberately heightened styling. The collections helped return the label to international runway visibility while making its historical femininity legible to a digitally connected audience.

7 For All Mankind appointed Brognano creative director in December 2025. His first collection, shown in New York for Autumn/Winter 2026, was also the brand’s first full runway presentation. He used the appointment to revisit skinny and bootcut denim, pronounced washes and elongated silhouettes while building a broader ready-to-wear framework around the company’s early-2000s product identity.

Brognano works with recognisable popular-fashion codes and increases their visual charge. At his own label and Blumarine, abbreviated proportions, close fits, vivid colour and nostalgic motifs were arranged with a deliberate sense of excess, using styling and silhouette to turn familiar references into a coherent runway image.

His practice often treats nostalgia as material rather than quotation alone. Low-rise trousers, narrow tops, faux fur, washed denim and glossy surfaces are adjusted through proportion, fabrication and casting so that the source period remains visible without being reproduced literally.

At 7 For All Mankind, that method is anchored in a product archive rather than a romantic house code. Fit, wash and denim weight carry more of the design argument, while skinny, bootcut and flare shapes are placed within a coordinated wardrobe. The approach keeps the brand’s commercial expertise in jeans in view while giving it a stronger seasonal image.