Nothing Sums up Bottega Veneta Better Than This $10,200 Leather T-Shirt
It took until the #NewNewNewBottega era for us to get the most Bottega Veneta T-shirt of all time.
The Italian house’s current creative director, Louise Trotter, began her tenure at the start of last year, following in the footsteps of Daniel Lee. Fans named his quietly radical vision “New Bottega” and documented it with a hashtag after the luxury brand left social media in 2018. His successor, Matthieu Blazy, spearheaded the #NewNewBottega movement before landing one of the biggest jobs in the biz as Chanel’s creative director. This led to Trotter taking the reins for what feels a lot like brand-new Bottega but also old-new Bottga. Amidst a spate of certified classics that include flawless outerwear and killer footwear, Trotter quietly debuted what is presumably the ultimate Bottega tee.
It’s surprising that neither Lee nor Blazy opted to do what Trotter has done, because in hindsight it seems so obvious. Bottega Veneta is first and foremost a luxury leather label and its signature intrecciato technique, where strips of leather are woven into a crisscrossing pattern, has informed everything from suitcases to lamps to rubber clogs to Jenga sets.
Both Lee and Blazy spent their tenures intrecciato-ing almost everything. Louise Trotter found a gap in Bottega’s expansive leather offering, which the Bottega Veneta Mini Intrecciato T-shirt was born to fill.
The unlined leather top features thin strips of Bottega’s famously supple leather, handwoven in Italy and finished with a leather collar. It’ll set you back $10,200, which is supremely expensive for a T-shirt but actually makes some sense for a handmade leather layer.
This is not the first Bottega leather tee, though. In 2023, Blazy’s made T-shirts from calfskin leather that were indistinguishable from regular cotton tees thanks to a clever trompe l'oeil detail also applied to denim jeans and jackets. Trotter’s tee is the final piece of the intrecciato puzzle, though: this woven leather top naturally pairs with Bottega’s countless intrecciato bags, pants, hats, and shoes.
The intrecciato uniform is complete.
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