Palace coup: Prada unveils new virtual museum

Milan – Prada’s autumn/winter 2012 menswear collection has a digital home in the brand’s new Il Palazzo app for the iPad.

Prada’s Il Palazzo project features work by visual effects specialist James Lima and fashion illustrator Richard Haines. Prada commissioned Haines to produce original drawings of the menswear collection in smudged charcoal, later turning them into a limited-edition book. Lima then created a virtual environment for the drawings.

The result is a mash-up of the illustrator’s signature style, which Prada says bears ‘the charming imperfections that can only be left by human hands’, with the cold digital precision of Lima’s 3D modelling.

Lima previously worked with Prada to promote the brand’s Swing sunglasses, producing a trippy video in which viewers zoomed through a 3D rendering of Manhattan.

Prada’s virtual environment has a Netstalgic feel that recalls first-person games such as Myst while also celebrating the brand’s Italian heritage.