2024-04-14 06:54:41
The world bid farewell to one of the most famous Italian fashion icons in the world, fashion designer Roberto Cavalli, in his hometown of Florence, at the age of 83. After a busy career and indescribable international fame. Despite his humble beginning in the world of fashion, Cavalli was able to create many fashion trends, which are still adopted to this day, and his international fashions became famous for his snake and tiger prints, giraffe spots, butterfly wings, chiffon threads, sequins, glitter, and sparkling materials. .
Cavalli was born on November 15, 1940 in Florence. He began his career by drawing and painting on T-shirts with the aim of earning some money during his studies in the field of arts. His grandfather, Giuseppe Rossi, was a famous painter. Cavalli followed in his grandfather’s footsteps by enrolling in the Florence Academy of Arts, where he began experimenting with drawing, sewing and weaving. In a previous interview, Cavalli said: “My dream – perhaps because of my family – was to be a painter, but in one moment I chose the direction of textiles, and from textiles I went into the world of fashion design.”
Over time, he developed an innovative leather printing technique, which earned him collaborations with fashion brands such as Hermès and Pierre Cardin, and set him on a creative path built on a flamboyant and luxurious aesthetic. In 1970, he was at a party held by a well-known fashion designer, where he had to lie and say that he worked in the field of leather printing to justify his presence. In the same year, he presented his first eponymous collection in Paris in 1970, before making its debut on the catwalks in Florence and Milan in 1972. In the same year, he opened his first store in Saint-Tropez, the French coastal city that would become a global symbol of glamor and luxury. Since the 1970s, Cavalli has been known for his passion for Ferraris, horses, cigars, bronze-colored clothes, and revealing shirts. He also owned a purple helicopter and a vineyard in Tuscany, and had a lifestyle similar to that of rock and pop stars. He also loved living among nature and the sea, as he lived with his family on an old farm, and raised many animals, including parrots, dogs, and cats. “I love everything related to nature,” he said in an interview with Vogue magazine in 2011.
He presented a group of dazzling designs with stars such as Sophia Loren and Brigitte Bardot, and moved on to become the mainstay of stars on the red carpet, where he dressed everyone from different generations over the years, from Jennifer Lopez and Beyoncé to Christina Aguilera, Kate Moss, Kim Kardashian and others, and his look was attractive and striking. It embraces and compliments your body shape with elegance.
Despite the great successes he achieved in his life, he also knew some failures, especially in the 1980s, when his ornate style seemed far from the “minimalist” character that was popular in that period. In the mid-1990s, Cavalli revolutionized… Denim world With a number of innovations, including the stretch jeans he created by adding Lycra to the fabric, and the sandblasting process for denim pieces, which gave them a lively effect. However, the fashion show in which these jeans were presented, in 1993, and which was worn on the catwalk by model Naomi Campbell, made them widely spread throughout the world. Along with animal prints, denim became a staple of his signature style, leading to the creation of a more youthful sub-brand, Just Cavalli, in 1998.
In a lecture at Oxford University in 2013, Cavalli explained his passion for wild animal patterns, which he used in everything from jeans to red carpet dresses: “I love nature, animals have the best fashions. God created them with very beautiful clothes. Women love these designs.” “And they feel natural there.” “I realized that even fish have wonderful colorful dresses, as do snakes and tigers,” he said in one of his interviews with the international press.
In the 2000s, Cavalli opened his first café-store in Florence and the Just Cavalli club in Milan, which became a beacon of the city’s famous nightlife.
During his career, he suffered from legal problems when he was accused of tax evasion and then acquitted. He also faced huge losses that forced him to sell the majority of the shares in his house in 2015.
“Roberto loved to exaggerate, but he never lost his point,” Nina Garcia, editor-in-chief of Elle magazine, said in an email in 2020. “Even when minimalism in design was the norm, he believed in being different. He dressed us.” Clothes, believing that life and fashion should be lived at full speed.”
While Peter Dundas, who served as the brand’s chief designer and later creative director before leaving in 2016 to start his own brand, said in an interview that Cavalli represented “the pop star in everyone.” Cavalli has dressed pop stars, including Jennifer Lopez, Beyoncé, Christina Aguilera, Shakira and the Spice Girls, for whom he designed clothes for their 2007 reunion tour.
Cavalli obtained patents for design methods that attracted the attention of international houses such as Hermes and Pierre Cardin. As much as his lifestyle was different, all of this was evident in the patterns on the fabrics that he invented new ways to print, dye, and process, by mixing materials, colors, patterns, and prints in a style that represented only him.
Cavalli retired from active duty with his brand in 2015, and chose designer Peter Dundas to succeed him as creative director. Dundas left the job following just three seasons, and was succeeded by Paul Surridge, who stayed on until 2019. In the same year, following a period of financial difficulties that led to bankruptcy, the company was taken over by a Dubai-based private investment firm, which has since enlisted the help of designer Fausto Puglisi for her fashion collections, and has branched out into Cavalli-branded real estate and hospitality ventures.
Cavalli’s Instagram account also shared a statement written by Roberto’s CEO, in which he mourned the international designer with moving words, writing what he meant: “Dear Roberto, you may no longer be with us in body, but I know that I will always feel your spirit with me. It is a great honor in my professional career.” To work under your legacy and create the brand you established with this vision and style. Rest in peace. You will be missed and loved by so many that your name will continue as a beacon of inspiration for others.”
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