Fendi and Versace closed out Milan Fashion Week 2022 in exceptional style at Palazzo Versace on Via Gesù on Sunday night with a history-making runway show — Fendace.

Fendace is a pre-spring 2022 pop-up collection that fuses the two heritage Italian brands. Donatella Versace switched places with Kim Jones, Fendi’s women’s wear artistic director, and Silvia Venturini Fendi, Fendi’s men’s wear designer, so the designers could reinterpretation the vision of the other’s brand.

“It’s a first in the history of fashion: two designers having a true creative dialogue that stems from respect and friendship,” stated Versace. “It led to us swapping roles to create these two collections.”

The Versace by Fendi collection explored the idea of duality — most pointedly seen in the fusing of the iconic Fendi monogram with Versace’s signature Greek Key motif. The looks were designed to morph and change, with many pieces reversible or concealing hidden codes, with an emphasis on multigenerational design.

The Fendi by Versace collection took on a punk-rock aesthetic, with Donatella focusing on “contamination and disruption”. Versace safety pins embellished Fendi classics in a series that was designed to feel youthfully rebellious.

The show notes on behalf of the two brands explained: “With the archives fully opened to both, a unique cross-fertilisation occurs, with elements transposed from each house; at heart remains a deep admiration for the codes and cultures of both, together with a mutual encouragement for the designers to be themselves. Needless to say, the results could only be achieved with fundamental respect and reciprocal trust. Ultimately, Fendace is about the need for sincerity in fashion today rather than strategy.”

There were also lots of Baguette bags in honour of Silvia Venturini Fendi, who invented the It-bag in the 1990s.

Both houses share a love of Supers, so the show featured some of the most famous models of the past three decades — also a tribute to Gianni who is credited with inventing the Supermodel. Shalom Harlow, Amber Valletta, and Kate Moss walked the Versace by Fendi section while Gigi Hadid and Naomi Campbell closed Fendi by Versace.

September 20 is Magic Mushroom Day. Similarly to stoners celebrating 4/20 and 7/10, and LSD enthusiasts celebrating 4/19, entheogenic communities around the world celebrate the psychedelic renaissance on 9/20.

The concept was coined in 2015 when Nicholas Reville, a mushroom advocate from Providence, Rhode Island, declared September 20 as an “educational day of action,” apparently citing the spirit of 4/20 as an opportunity to talk about psilocybin reform, regulations and, of course, rejoice in the magic of psychedelics.

“9/20 was chosen because it is at the beginning of autumn, when mushrooms are most plentiful; because it is close to the equinox, representing a change in direction; and because it echoes 4/20 and the successful movement for marijuana decriminalization and legalization,” said Reville in an interview with Rolling Stone.

Magic Mushrooms: The Next “Green” Wave?

Interest around the benefits and effects of psilocybin, the main active ingredient in magic mushrooms, has been steadily growing over the last number of years, with legalization closely following.

In May 2019, Denver became the first city to decriminalize psilocybin. Oakland soon followed with its own law in June that same year, decriminalizing plant and fungi psychedelics.

At the last election in 2020, Oregon became the first state to legalize psilocybin with Measure 109 for mental health treatment in supervised settings.

At the same time, the District of Columbia decriminalize the use of magic mushrooms and other psychedelic substances with the passage of Initiative 81.

At Fohse, meeting the challenges faced by indoor cannabis cultivators with superior lighting solutions is the prime directive. It’s a niche that co-founder and CEO Brett Stevens says is rife with opportunity for those with the talent to innovate. A serial entrepreneur with several successful exits in new and emerging markets under his belt, Stevens is now firmly focused on the cannabis industry.

“I originally got into the farming side of it, and I could definitely see where at that time, five or six years ago, there were so many holes that needed to be filled. It was kind of like, pick a side and go with it,” Stevens told Cannabis Aficionado.

The sector he believed had the most potential to impact the cannabis industry was engineering, and Stevens had kept his ear to the ground for tech opportunities, specifically for cannabis. So, when an engineer friend shared his design for advanced LED lighting, he saw a chance to bring value to a nascent industry.

Unapologetically Pro-Cannabis

For Las Vegas-based Fohse, the vision is to continually expand the tech in the cannabis industry, and Stevens is proud and unapologetic about the company’s focus.

“We’ve pigeonholed ourselves into the cannabis industry. We didn’t create the light for any other plant,” he explained. “We are sold on the plant. We’re sold on the medical purposes of the plant, and we really want to be there as the plant is more readily explored.” 

In order to be true innovators, Fohse doesn’t settle for the services of outside engineers. Instead, the company has its own in-house engineering team creating cannabis lighting solutions from the ground up. Stevens touched on SolidWorks, a 3D computer-aided design (CAD) program, that Fohse’s engineering team uses for their technical drawings. 

“We do all our material science, and we do all of our material engineering to make sure that the materials we’re using to dissipate heat or to project that photon where it needs to go [are sound]. We’re doing all that in-house.” he explained.

A Company Driven by the Question, “What If?”

Stevens noted that he’s not one to micromanage his executive team though. Instead, he said that his leadership style is to assemble a solid corps of professionals and let them go to work. And as inspiration, he encourages his engineers to continuously ask, “What if?”

“What if we could do ten pounds a light?” he wondered aloud. “What if we could do four micromoles per joule? How would we do that?” 

“We’re consistently thinking, ‘How can we be more efficient, and more powerful?’ And I think that’s what drives me,” he added.

According to Stevens, the combined talent and drive at Fohse are producing the most advanced LED lights available to cannabis cultivators. And that’s not just an assertion. It’s a claim that is backed by the company’s research.

“We are literally the most powerful and the most efficient light in the world right now,” Stevens said, adding that Fohse has done grow ops where they have bought and tested every single competitor’s light.

“There’s no question,” Stevens states confidently. “We will outgrow anything on the market.”

Creating an Industry Standard for Indoor Cannabis Cultivators

When his company entered the business, Stevens says the light manufacturing industry was racing to the bottom, with everyone trying to produce the cheapest lamps that would still grow cannabis. But Fohse took a different approach altogether.

“We looked at it more like, ‘What if we put massive power supplies and 5,000 diodes in a light?’ and ‘What if we could replicate indoor sunlight?’” he explained, adding that they focused closely on grams per square foot. 

“Because in the end, that’s what it comes down to, right?” he asked. “If you have a finite amount of space, the more you can grow in that area, the more productive and the more successful you’ll be.”

Constantly striving to increase productivity and efficiency for indoor cannabis cultivators is what the team at Fohse is all about. And that drive, Stevens says, will become increasingly evident when the company’s products are known as the industry standard.

“I think that we’re hungry, that we’re always advancing. We will not stop until we will reach the absolute pinnacle,” he pledged.