As Bottega Veneta doubles down on its inimitable Padded Cassette, it's unearthing major moments from its own legacy to honor the timeless bag.
Reintroducing: Andy Warhol's Bottega campaign.
Yup, the world-famous artist personally oversaw a campaign for Bottega Veneta, which has been newly overhauled for 2022 with a focus on the Padded Cassette
Co-created with Laura Moltedo (née Braggion) — a Warhol assistant, Factory regular, and the woman who inherited Bottega Veneta from her ex-husband, co-founder Michele Taddei.
Moltedo brought in Warhol and an ad agency to create the "When your own initials are enough" campaign, which ran in Warhol's Interview magazine in 1978.
This inextricably united Bottega's iconic intrecciato stitching with a notion of understated elegance; stealth-wealth before the term had even been codified.
Of course, Bottega is not only known for its intrecciato weave — rendered in XL scale atop the Padded Cassette — but that unmistakable parakeet green, which the maison has publicly reclaimed in recent years (most recently with the color-drenched Bottega app).
Like intrecciato, parakeet green isn't a New Bottega motif. It's been around for decades, gracing the Bottega Veneta Vienna storefront seen in the Polaroid photos above and dictating the packaging seen in Bottega Veneta Industrial Videotape, a 1985 Bottega campaign film that Warhol also oversaw.
The ample push to celebrate Bottega Veneta's Padded Cassette follows a few landmark moments in the house's recent history, including its sponsored relaunch of BUTT and the introduction of Matthieu Blazy's FW22 collection.
Bottega has plenty of other "It Bags" in its stable of plush leather accessories but few speak as directly to the Bottega Veneta ethos as the Padded Cassette.
Amidst 2022's newfound Warhol renaissance, fitting that the Padded Cassette is having its own moment.
