Happy Birthday to Fashion Designer Valentino

Valentino Clemente Ludovico Garavani was born today, May 11, in 1932. He is best known as Valentino, an Italian fashion designer and founder of the Valentino SpA brand and company. His main lines include Valentino, Valentino Garavani, Valentino Roma, and R.E.D. Valentino.

Valentino was born in Voghera, in the province of Pavia, Lombardy, Italy. He became interested in fashion while in primary school in his native Voghera, Lombardy, northern Italy, when he apprenticed under his aunt Rosa and local designer Ernestina Salvadeo, an aunt of noted artist Aldo Giorgini. Valentino then moved to Paris to pursue this interest with the help of his mother Teresa de Biaggi and his father Mauro Garavani. There he studied at the École des Beaux-Arts and at the Chambre Syndicale de la Couture Parisienne.

He found an apprenticeship with Jean Dessès where he helped Countess Jacqueline de Ribes sketch her dress ideas. He then joined Guy Laroche for 2 years. At Jean Dessès, Valentino sketched furiously, between helping with window dressing and greeting clients for the daily 2:30 pm private showings.

After 5 years, Valentino left Jean Dessès over an incident about prolonging a vacation in Saint-Tropez that still makes him uncomfortable today. Rescued by his friend Guy Laroche, he joined his "tiny, tiny" fashion house.

In 1960 Valentino left Paris and opened a fashion house in Rome on the posh Via Condotti with the backing of his father and an associate of his. More than an atelier, the premises resembled a real "maison de couture," it being very much along the lines of what Valentino had seen in Paris: everything was very grand and models flew in from Paris for his first show. Valentino became known for his red dresses, in the bright shade that became known in the fashion industry as "Valentino red."

On 31 July 1960, Valentino met Giancarlo Giammetti at the Café de Paris on the Via Veneto in Rome. One of three children, Giammetti was in his second year of architecture school, living at home with his parents in the haut bourgeois Parioli section of Northern Rome. That day Giammetti gave Valentino a lift home in his Fiat and a friendship, as well as a long-lasting partnership, started. The day after, Giammetti was to leave for Capri for vacation and, by coincidence, Valentino was also going there, so they met again on the island 10 days later. Giammetti would shortly thereafter abandon the University to become Valentino's business partner. When Giammetti arrived, the business situation of Valentino's atelier was in fact not brilliant: in a year he had spent so much money that his father's associate pulled out of the business, and had to fight against bankruptcy.

Valentino's international debut took place in 1962 in Florence, the Italian fashion capital of the time.

At some point in 1964, Jacqueline Kennedy had seen Gloria Schiff, the twin sister of the Rome-based fashion editor of American Vogue and Valentino's friend Consuelo Crespi, wearing a two-piece ensemble in black organza at a gathering. It made such an impression that Kennedy contacted Ms. Schiff to learn the name of the ensemble's designer, which was Valentino. 

In September 1964, Valentino was to be in the United States to present a collection of his work at a charity ball at New York's Waldorf-Astoria Hotel. Mrs. Kennedy wanted to view the collection but could not attend the event, so Valentino decided to send a model, sales representative and a selection of key pieces from his collection to Mrs. Kennedy's apartment on Fifth Avenue. Mrs. Kennedy ordered six of his haute couture dresses, all in black and white, and wore them during her year of mourning following President John F. Kennedy's assassination. From then on, she was a devoted client and would become a friend. Valentino would later design the white Valentino Gown worn by Kennedy at her wedding to Greek tycoon Aristotle Onassis. In 1966 he moved his shows from Florence to Rome where 2 years later he produced an all-white collection that became famous for the "V" logo he designed.

Throughout the 1970s Valentino spent considerable time in New York City, where his presence was embraced by society personalities such as Vogue's editor-in-chief Diana Vreeland and the art icon Andy Warhol.

1990 marked the opening of the Accademia Valentino, designed by architect Tommaso Ziffer, a cultural space located near Valentino's atelier in Rome, for the presentation of art exhibitions. The next year, encouraged by their friend Elizabeth Taylor, Valentino Garavani and Giancarlo Giammetti created L.I.F.E., an association for the support of AIDS-related patients, which benefits from the activities of the Accademia Valentino.

In 1998 Valentino and his partner Giancarlo Giammetti sold the company for approximately US$300 million to HdP, an Italian conglomerate controlled, in part, by the late Gianni Agnelli, the head of Fiat. In 2002, Valentino S.p.A., with revenues of more than $180 million, was sold by HdP to Marzotto Apparel, a Milan-based textile giant, for $210 million. Maison Valentino is controlled since 2012 by Mayhoola for Investments S.P.C., a holding company sustained by a group of private investors from Qatar. It is present in over 90 countries through 160 Valentino directly-operated boutiques and over 1300 points of sale.

In September 2007, Valentino announced that he would retire fully in January 2008 from the world stage after his last haute couture show in Paris. 

In 2012–2013 a major new exhibition opened at Somerset House in London celebrating the life and work of Valentino, showcasing over 130 exquisite haute couture designs.

In 2006 Valentino appeared in a cameo role, as himself, in the hit movie The Devil Wears Prada.

Valentino: The Last Emperor a feature-length documentary film on the designer, premiered at the 2008 Venice International Film Festival. Produced and directed by Matt Tyrnauer, special correspondent for Vanity Fair magazine, the film follows Valentino and his inner circle throughout various events, including last year's anniversary show celebrating his 45-year career.

In the film, Valentino and Giammetti discuss how they met in 1960 in Via Veneto, the epicenter of Rome's Dolce Vita. Ever since they have been together for more than 50 years, even if their love relationship ended in 1972. As told by Giancarlo in his private memoirs, in 1973 Valentino met 19-year-old Carlos Souza at Hippopotamus club in Rio de Janeiro, dating him until Carlos would eventually marry Brazilian socialite Charlene Shorto in 1983. Valentino and Giancarlo would later become the godfathers of Charlene and Carlos' sons, Sean and Anthony. Carlos and Charlene would work in PR for the Maison Valentino even after their divorce in 1990, keeping a close relationship ever since.

As narrated in "Private" by Giancarlo Giammetti, Valentino in the early 1980s met his current boyfriend Bruce Hoeksema, who started as a model at Valentino to later become the vice president of the Maison. Giammetti said that he and Valentino together with Carlos, Charlene and Bruce form a real family. Part of this enlarged family called the "tribe" is also composed by Spanish Duchess Naty Abascal, French-Brazilian Princess Georgina Brandolini d'Adda and Valentino PR Daniela Giardina.

Valentino and Giammetti's lifestyle has been considered flamboyant. John Fairchild, editor-at-large at Women's Wear Daily and W, told Vanity Fair,Valentino and Giancarlo are the kings of high living. Every other designer looks and says, ‘How do they live the way they do?’ I don’t think they made the money that Valentino and Giancarlo did, because Giancarlo knows how to make money. If they did, they didn’t spend the money like Valentino. No other designer ever did. When the terrorism first started in Rome – the period when the Red Brigades were kidnapping people – Valentino was riding around in a bulletproof Mercedes. And do you know what color the Mercedes was? Red. My God, I thought, you must want to get blown up.

Valentino adores dogs to the point that he once named a second line of clothing after his late pug Oliver. Today Valentino owns six pugs. When traveling on his 14-seat Challenger jet, three cars are needed to move Valentino and his entourage to the airport: one to move Valentino and Giammetti, another for the luggage and the staff, and a third to transport five of six Valentino's pugs as one of them, Maude, always travels with Valentino.