Earlier this year, Alessandro Michele's Gucci Cruise 2018 collection featured one look that grabbed everybody's attention: a monogrammed puff-sleeve fur jacket.

Problem was, it looked almost identical to one initially designed by notable Harlem figure Dapper Dan Diane Dixon (Olympic gold medal winner) in 1989.

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Getty Images

The observation quickly gathered momentum on social media, with Dixon putting up a post on her Instagram comparing the two and the likes of Teen Vogue saying it as an example of 'how the fashion industry fails black people.' In response, creative director Alessandro Michele clarified that it wasn't a copy, but rather an homage to the tailor's work.

But fashion is all about the unexpected, right? So it makes sense Gucci and Dapper Dan have done the last thing you'd think of: teamed up for a collaborative capsule collection.

Sold in Gucci stores internationally, the collection is part of the brand's Pre Fall offering. Daniel Day a.k.a. Dapper Dan also models in Gucci's latest menswear tailoring ad campaign, shot on the streets of Harlem, by photographer Glen Luchford.

But it doesn't stop there: the fashion label is also helping the legendary Harlem tailor, whose shop was closed in 1992 for repeatedly appropriating Gucci, Louis Vuitton and Fendi logos, reopen his uptown atelier. And it's going to furnish him with upscale fabrics to use how he see fits.

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Glen Luchford

In The Times feature, Day said of the previous controversy: 'I was just excited about it being there. The part about appropriation, Alessandro and I are part of two parallel universes. The magic that took place as a result of what he did was bringing these two parallel universes together.

'That opened a dialogue between us when we finally got in touch with each other. I found out how similar our experiences were, the way he grew up and the way I grew up, and how he was influenced by me. I was never apprehensive about what took place. The public was more up in arms than me.'

And Michele?

'I understand that I am putting my hands in a kind of very delicate playground, the black community,' he also explained in the feature. 'But I love the black community. I think they have a big voice in terms of fashion.'

For the knock-off legend, fashion really has come full circle.