Ricky Martin and Hudson Williams joined a star-studded front row Monday for Giorgio Armani's menswear runway collection.

The only Black designer belonging to Italy’s fashion chamber has withdrawn from this month’s Milan Fashion Week, alleging a lack of support for diversity and inclusion after the chamber “abandoned” a project to promote young designers of color working in Italy.

Caught between the pandemic and war in Europe, Milan luxury fashion designers on Friday open four days of mostly menswear previews for next spring and summer in a challenging economic climate.

Milan fashion houses were charting a path out of the pandemic that included a menswear calendar packed with 22 live runway shows and another 18 physical presentations this month.

FILE - In this Thursday, Sept. 20, 2018 file photo, Carlo Capasa, head of the National Chamber of Italian Fashion, attends the Fendi women's 2019 Spring-Summer fashion show, during the Fashion Week in Milan, Italy. Italys fashion chamber opens the first Milan Fashion Week on Friday with no VIPS populating runway front rows, as the reality of the persistent virus resurgence in Italy has forced an all-digital, no physical week of menswear previews. The National Fashion Chamber maintained a live element during the July and September fashion weeks in Milan. The organizers of Paris Fashion Week plan to hold audience-free men’s and haute couture shows later this month. The Italian fashion chamber found that 45 million people streamed Milan Fashion Week shows in September, a number that Capasa said was beyond his wildest dreams a year ago.