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Italian Fashion Newsletter - January 1998
The Gucci company has often benefited of a great press coverage not only through paid avertisements on trend-setting fashion magazines but also on tabloid newspapers and gossip publications worldwide. This because of the many incredible events that periodically involved somehow the fabled Gucci family.
The authors, Angelo Pergolini and Maurizio Tortorella, start the story from the first meeting between Maurizio and Patrizia Martinelli Reggiani, his future wife and alleged murderer. Then a long flash back narrates how years of family squabbling nearly brought down a fashion empire created by
Guccio Gucci in 1922, that is when the founder opened a tiny leather-good s shop on the narrow via del Parione in Florence. A fairy tale gone sour with an intricate plot: sons sue their fathers for tax evasion and corruption, wives sue their husbands, nephews fire their uncles and wives ask lawyers all the time how to kill their husbands. However, the most amusing pages are those portraying Patrizia Reggiani, a woman obsessed with money, dazzling jewels, expensive dresses, parties and social climbing. A character often seen on tv serials like "Dynasty" or "The Bold and the Beautiful" but rarely in real life. According to the authors, she never made secret of her hatred towards the man that dared to leave her for a younger blonde woman, Paola Franchi. After separating from Maurizio, Patrizia obtained the custody of her two daughters and lived in a plush penthouse overlooking Piazza San Babila in downtown Milan. Maurizio instead moved with his new companion in a nearby palazzo on Corso Venezia.
After two years of fruitless investigations came the epilogue. On January 31st 1997 the police woke up Patrizia Reggiani at 4.30 a.m. and took her into custody. At the same time officers arrested Giuseppina Auriemma, Patrizia's personal sorceress and former owner of the Gucci store in Naples and Ivano Savioni, a Milan hotel porter who arranged Mr. Gucci's murder by engaging two acquaintances.
At the end of the story an appendix tells us what are now doing Gucci family members without their company. We learn that Maurizio's daughters, Alessandra and Allegra, now live in Sankt Moritz with their grandmother.
Above right, Maurizio Gucci at the inauguration of the refurbished
Florentine Gucci store in September 1991; above left, Patrizia Martinelli Reggiani, his former wife on the day of her arrest; right, the imposing Creole; left, Patrizia Gucci, Paolo's younger daughter.
Gian Marco Ansaloni
"The Last of The Guccis" - Book Review
by Gian Marco Ansaloni
Yes, this kind of publicity has not always be consistent with the cool, sexy and modern images of the most recent Gucci ads, but probably the current popularity of the Florentine brand is partly due to
the daring misadventures of its family members that so often filled pages
of newspapers.
And, since in these days everything carrying the Gucci name on it immediately becomes a blockbuster, that's why two journalists from Italian leading newsmagazine Panorama decided to run through again the history of the Gucci saga with the most recent updates. The book is titled "L'ultimo dei Gucci" (The Last of the Guccis) referring of course to the controversial Maurizio, the nephew of old patriarch Aldo. As you'll probably remember Maurizio Gucci was cold-bloodedly gunned down in Milan on March 27th 1995.
Before this book, only English writer Gerald McKnight wrote a biography about the Gucci family
in his book titled "Gucci: A House Divided" in 1988.
The rights of "L'ultimo dei Gucci" have already been acquired by Japanese publishers in order to satisfy crowds of local Gucci fans: many of them won't be able to approach local Gucci prices (approximately 40 % higher than European ones) but at least will afford this unauthorized biography of one of the most litigious fashion empires.
When Maurizio was killed by four shots on the stairway of his new Milan offices on Via Palestro on March 27th 1995, Patrizia immediately flung herself to Maurizio's home ordering Paola to leave that apartment. Patrizia in fact knew that Maurizio was on the brink of marrying Paola and she was worried of losing access to Gucci's billionaire legacy, composed mostly of the funds Maurizio received when he sold the company to the Arabs of Investcorp, luxurious houses in Milan, New York, Sankt Moritz and the Creole, a 65 mt. black three-master built in the twenties by Camper & Nicholson and once owned by Stavros Niarchos.
Roberto, Maurizio' s cousin, instead works in Florence with his numerous family producing elegant bags bearing the "House of Florence" trademark. His shop is located on the Via Tornabuoni near the original Gucci store. Patrizia Gucci (another cousin of Maurizio and Paolo's younger daughter) worked at Gucci until 1992 and now restarted her career as a painter. She successfully presented her works at Le Royal Meridien Gallery in Bahrein last summer and plans to create her own line of accessories. Giorgio Gucci, another son of Aldo, now lives in Porto Santo Stefano, Tuscany where he breeds horses and owns an art gallery. Instead the Gucci brand is a public company listed at the New York Stock Exchange, (always the dream of Aldo) headed by Domenico De Sole, Maurizio's former lieutenant in the US. He won credit for managing the turnaround by expanding the number of stores worldwide and updating brand image thanks also to talented creative director Tom Ford.
This year Gucci sales will exceed $. 1bn, that is more than five times 1993 total sales. Maurizio's dream of a global brand has come true but only after his death. Perhaps, had the Gucci known the huge potential of their name, they wouldn't have behaved as they did.