September 23, 2025 |
United Colors of Benetton has never been shy about a bold visual. But this season, with the AW25 campaign, the brand has handed the reins to Rick Dick – Italy’s most meme-savvy, irony-dripping, AI-wielding digital artist – and the result is nothing short of an acid-bright, joyous fever dream.
Known for hijacking the fashion conversation with viral posts and gleefully absurd AI renderings, Rick Dick is hardly your usual campaign photographer. His Instagram is a cocktail of satire, surrealism and digital collage that makes you stop mid-scroll and mutter “what in the world?” – before double-tapping anyway. So, pairing him with Benetton, a label historically synonymous with fearless, disruptive visuals, feels like the kind of logic only fashion could pull off.
The campaign puts knitwear – Benetton’s holy grail – front and centre, but with Rick Dick’s fingerprints all over it. Sweaters swish with the jubilant movements of models while wool takes on intoxicating textures. The result is playful, unnerving and oddly beautiful – a digital-age manifesto on what knitwear means now.
Benetton, a brand that built its identity on inclusivity and visual provocation, is betting that Rick Dick’s AI eye can bridge heritage with next-gen attention spans. It’s not nostalgia, but reinvention: a brand fluent in colour and fabric now speaking in a digital dialect.
The AW25 campaign is Benetton reminding us that knitwear isn’t just soft; it’s strong, adaptable and – under Rick Dick’s warped, witty gaze – completely alive.
Photography courtesy of United Colors of Benetton.
