'The Fendi Set' Follows Kim Jones' Fascination With the Bloomsbury Group

Kim Jones draws inspiration for his work at Fendi from painters Vanessa Bell, Duncan Grant, and Roger Fry and writers Clive Bell and Virginia Woolf, all part of the 20th-century English artistic and literary movement known as the Bloomsbury group. The Fendi Set is an in-depth exploration of his debut year as creative director, bringing in a striking level of romance to the house. In the book, copies of original letters and diary entries created by such members of the Bloomsbury Group are used to juxtapose the photography of Nikolai von Bismarck.

Divided into three parts, with a preface by Tilda Swinton, the book begins with Gwendoline Christie channeling her best Virginia Woolf in Fendi haute couture pieces by Jones, set in the pastoral Sussex and Kent.

It then travels onto modern-day Paris, taking us to Jones' first couture show for the house during the Spring/Summer 2021 Haute Couture season. Von Bismarck captures the silhouettes of the gowns, worn on Demi Moore, Kate and Lila Moss, Naomi Campbell, Cara Delevingne, Bella Hadid, and Christy Turlington.

The final section of the book takes us to Rome, where Jones' first ready-to-wear collection, Fall/Winter 2021, is displayed, photographed by von Bismarck in the historic Villa Medici, a space in which members of the Bloomsbury Group gathered often. 

Said Jones, "Over eleven months I had the opportunity to go deep—to research, visit and photograph the houses and gardens the Bloomsbury group lived in and decorated, many of which are still remarkably intact, to see the desks they worked at, even the beds they slept in, to walk through the Sussex and Kent countryside in their footsteps and follow them to Rome, and visit the studios they worked and lived in as well as the various sites they painted, sketched and described in their letters and books."

The Fendi Set is an exquisite vision of Jones' inspiration and allows us to explore the through lines of his collections.