‘Elegance is not catching someone’s eyes, it’s staying in somebody’s memory,’ Giorgio Armani once said. And he would know – everyone who is anyone in chic European royal circles wears Armani, such is the fashion house’s cachet. Now, as the Italian designer enters his 10th decade, those words have never rung truer.
‘Quiet luxury’, ‘stealth wealth’ and ‘old money vibes’ might be new terms, but they all apply to Armani’s silhouettes. Ever since 1975, when he started Giorgio Armani SpA with £8,000 at the age of 41, Mr Armani has always taken fashion’s high road, opting for grace over gimmick and favouring the greatest style ethos: simplicity. Having risen through the mid-century boom of Italian labels working for Allegri, Bagutta and Montedoro, he’d already made a name for himself on the fashion circuit.
But Armani quickly established himself in a class above his peers, with tailoring to die for and unabashedly elegant eveningwear. He won over the Hollywood set and his name became synonymous with red-carpet sophistication. Julia Roberts stunned at the 1990 Golden Globes in an off-the-rack men’s Armani suit.
The following year, married Richard Gere wearing a navy Armani suit. Then there were the diplomats and , including Caroline Kennedy, Lee Radziwill and Diana, Princess of Wales (a black Armani jacket was the last garment the princess ever put on). A 1992 American editorial titled ‘The Armani Edge’ described the designer as a ‘quiet perfe.
