The latest in the series of fashion books from British Vogue, which tell the fascinating stories of iconic designers accompanied by world-class photographs and illustrations from the Vogue archive.
Gianni Versace created a fashion house that, as Vogue declared, defined late twentieth-century glamour, invented the supermodel and sanctioned in the public consciousness a supremely self-assured feminine sexuality.´ His debut line in 1978 was instantly successful; in the Eighties, his extravagant designs and his vision of powerful women defined the era, and culminated in the Nineties with the supermodel phenomenon - his designs worn by those glamazons who featured on every Vogue cover. Vogue on Gianni Versace explores how his childhood spent in his mother´s dressmaker´s shops, his Italian hometown of Reggio Calabria, and his family, particularly his younger sister, Donatella, influenced not only the designer he became - the insistent sensuality, vivid colours, classical motifs, clashing prints and daring cuts - but also the way he constructed his business: family first. The book reveals how the more brazen elements of his design - the jewelled embroidery, the bondage straps, the safety-pin gowns - were predicated on supremely skilled tailoring, deft use of materials and innovative techniques. Alongside are Vogue´s eye-witness accounts of the Versace lifestyle - the palazzos and parties, the art, the celebrity friends. Vogue on Gianni Versace is a celebration of a designer and a house that, in only 19 years, came to dominate the catwalk and the red carpet.