Why Dolce & Gabbana picked a war photographer for the brand's latest fashion campaign

When Domenico Dolce first called photographer Franco Pagetti he thought it was a mistake. Pagetti, who started his career at Vogue Italia, is known for his conflict photography of war zones including Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya and Palestine.

It is Pagetti’s bravery, ingenuity and skill that attracted the Italian fashion house to the lensman. The brief? “A simple reportage of our clothes in Napoli (Naples).”

“The campaign cannot be a report like I am used to,” was Pagetti’s initial response to Domenico. “In Baghdad and Libya, I walk around on my own taking pictures. I don’t have a bunch of people surrounding me.” His conditions of working, he tells The Telegraph, were no make-up artists, hairdressers or assistants fussing around him. “I want to be alone with my story and the people in front of my camera. More than the models the people of Napoli should be the star of the campaign.”

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The campaign is in keeping with the brand’s formula, which celebrates models mingling with Italian people of all demographics. The series of Pagetti’s photos show models, who were encouraged “not to act like models”, weaving through crowds in the picturesque cobbled streets of Spaccanapoli, with washing lines hung above and motorbikes parked in every corner.

“At first I was scared,” Pagetti tells The Telegraph of the shoot. It was not the transition from conflict to fashion, but rather the expensive clothes that first made his nerves jitter. Once he had the green light from Stefano and Domenico to “shoot what you need to shoot”, the rest came naturally.

“For me there is no difference,” he explains to us. “I don’t like being called a war photographer. I am a photographer because I like history, I like people. For me, taking pictures of these beautiful clothes in the middle of Napoli was an amazing story.”

“Everyone can take a picture in a studio,” Pagetti notes of his method of working. “People want realness. I encouraged the models to show their souls because we are all are tired of seeing unnatural shoots.” With dancing, whooping, clashing colours and - gasp! - other fashion labels displayed on the outfits of the Italian people, the campaign is a very refreshing one, indeed.

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