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Being Armani: A Biography
Recounting the 30 years that turned Giorgio Armani into an international fashion icon, this investigation of the man and the myth he built around himself explores how he maintained a distinct identity in an industry built upon rapid changes. Written with the designer’s cooperation and access to his personal archives, Armani’s story is accurately rendered, from his modest beginnings and early home environment to the influences and colleagues who helped build his name. Yet ultimately, this is the story of a man with an innate sense of style and unmatched entrepreneurial strategy, both of which allowed him to create a new way of thinking—an aesthetic genre that went beyond a world of appearance and clothing—that single-handedly changed the face of fashion forever.
- GenresBiography
216 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2006
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About the author
Renata Molho
9 books2 followersRenata Molho (Asmara, 5 maggio 1951) è una giornalista italiana.
Giornalista e saggista. Critica del costume e della moda per il quotidiano Il Sole 24 Ore, dal 1991 al gennaio 2012. Collaboratrice di testate del gruppo Condé Nast (Vogue Italia, L'Uomo Vogue). Ha tenuto diversi corsi di giornalismo di moda (IULM, IED, Universitò di Urbino). E' stata caporedattore de L'Uomo Vogue ed editor at large di L'Uomo Vogue, Vogue Italia e Casa Vogue.
È autrice tra l'altro della prima e unica biografia dello stilista Giorgio Armani, Essere Armani edita da Baldini, Castoldi Dalai nel 2006 - e nelle traduzioni in inglese (Baldini Castoldi Dalai Corp.), giapponese (Nikkei Publishing Inc.), coreano (Book@Books), russo (Azbooka), ebraico (Kinneret Zmora) portoghese (Arte Plural Edições) ed estone (Esti Ekspress). - e della monografia dedicata a CoSTUME NATIONAL (2007) edita da Assouline.
Giornalista e saggista. Critica del costume e della moda per il quotidiano Il Sole 24 Ore, dal 1991 al gennaio 2012. Collaboratrice di testate del gruppo Condé Nast (Vogue Italia, L'Uomo Vogue). Ha tenuto diversi corsi di giornalismo di moda (IULM, IED, Universitò di Urbino). E' stata caporedattore de L'Uomo Vogue ed editor at large di L'Uomo Vogue, Vogue Italia e Casa Vogue.
È autrice tra l'altro della prima e unica biografia dello stilista Giorgio Armani, Essere Armani edita da Baldini, Castoldi Dalai nel 2006 - e nelle traduzioni in inglese (Baldini Castoldi Dalai Corp.), giapponese (Nikkei Publishing Inc.), coreano (Book@Books), russo (Azbooka), ebraico (Kinneret Zmora) portoghese (Arte Plural Edições) ed estone (Esti Ekspress). - e della monografia dedicata a CoSTUME NATIONAL (2007) edita da Assouline.
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
October 1, 2016
p.60 – That first womenswear presentation, also for spring-summer 1976, was held three months later in an old Milanese restaurant in the Piazza del Duomo, the Ristorante Carminati. “There was a significant detail in that first collection,” Anna Piaggi later recalled, “even if it was ever so subtle, and slightly ironic.” This collection featured the first jackets for women, and in the same runway presentation a number of male models wore terry-cloth suits in garish colors. It was a crossbreeding of genders: the feminine touch softened the men’s fashion, while a hint of masculinity added force to the designs for women. Armani did it with a light touch, subtly introducing subversive ideas that slithered into the subconscious, transforming the collective imagination on a physiological level. In March 1976 the autumn-winter runway presentation, in the halls of the hotel Palace in Milan, introduced tweed women’s suits. The jacket had a decidedly mannish cut, but it was lightened and softened by the pleated skirt.
p.61 – Taking inspiration from the highly personal and nonconformist style of his sister, Rosanna, whom he greatly admired, and looking ahead to the future role of women in a rapidly changing society, Giorgio invented a different kind of women’s jacket that won immediately success. It was a translation of the men’s jacket: using traditional masculine fabrics and constructed with the same flowing line, though the proportions were changed, it conferred an unprecedented authority on the female figure.
p.65 – Success came quickly. The company, founded with capital of 10 million lire (roughly $10,000) in 1975, earned 80 million lire (roughly $80,000) with its first menswear collection and 30 million lire (roughly $30,000) with the first womenswear collection. Just one year later, its turnover increased to 569 million lire (over $500,000); ten years later, in 1985, it had swollen to 291 bilion lire, about $300,000 million).
p.66 – “America understood the importance of Giorgio Armani before anyone else because it was a country with a pioneering spirit, where women suddenly found themselves in the workplace where they needed a new kind of armor.” (Natalia Aspesi) They needed clothing suitable for the office, but they wanted it to be attractive, too. Armani understood the new demand his fashion fulfilled, stating in an interview with an Italian magazine, talking about his jackets: “I really do hope that they have given women a tone of relaxed confidence and the healthy sensation of being invulnerable,” adding that he further hoped the women who wore his clothes felt a little safer from the leering impertinence of men.
p.77 – On April 4, 1978, in Hollywood, Diane Keaton accepted her Best Actress Oscar for her role in Woody Allen’s Annie Hall wearing an Armani jackets.
p.78 – The Armani jacket became a full-fledged status symbol. John Travolta, whose first moment of major stardom came in the late seventies with his hits Saturday Night Fever and Grease, visited the Giorgio Armani atelier in Milan to select some forty suits that would be part of the wardrobe for American Gigolo (1980), in which he was supposed to star. (Travolta’s manager Bob Le Mond – already a passionate Armani fan – had persuaded director Paul Schrader that this new Italian style would word effectively in the movie.) But Travolta made the fatal misstep of turning down the role (opting instead to star in Urban Cowboy) and the part went to Richard Gere, costarring with Lauren Hutton – who would in time become a close friend and frequent spokesperson for Armani.
Perhaps the most influential was the famous scene in which Gere choses his outfit for the evening. Moving to the rhythm of a driving beat, he selects his ensemble with scientific precision from among his considerable array of jackets, shirts, and ties in a hitherto-unseen palette of harmonious colors. It was an image that became a billboard for the Armani style. The shadiness of the leading character was not just tempered by the confidently consistent aesthetic of his clothing, it was even ennobled to some extent. The suits, the accessories, the entire look belonged to an entirely new visual language. The shoulders – broad yet not stiff – the narrow lapels and waist, the softness of the fabrics, and the sense of restrained indulgence in the tailoring, all perfectly expressed the idea of sensuality.
p.79 – Armani rejected the label of designer to the stars: “I like to create clothing for people who work, and that includes actors and actresses, inasmuch as they are people who work, and not just as stars. I don’t want to become a dictator who imposes his likes and dislikes at all costs. I don’t believe that fashion should be a form of slavery. Wearing clothing should, however, be fun and reassuring, a way of feeling comfortable and confident,” he said.
p.81 – Nowadays, every designer vies to dress the stars of Hollywood, but for many years their wardrobes were the exclusive territory of Giorgio Armani. He was the first Italian designer to attract a genuine international following.
p.86 – This intense period saw, on the one hand, Thatcherism and the Falkland War and, on the other, glittering runway presentations, the punks in Kings Road, and the first New York graffiti artists.
p.191 – “Generally speaking, people use sexy to mean a style that reveals or shows off. I think that sexy is something different: for instance, a woman revealing a little of her boson beneath a man’s jacket. The sex appeal that most people talk about is much more open and much cheaper. Instead, I think showing your breasts isn’t sexy, I think little gestures that women make are sexy. The way they cross their legs, how they turn up their lapels or uncover an arm. I try to avoid the obvious, the cheap, the garish, the excessively simple, clear, or facile. On the contrary, I want to send subtler messages to my audience, I want to allow people to live as freely as they wish with the clothing that I offer.”
p.61 – Taking inspiration from the highly personal and nonconformist style of his sister, Rosanna, whom he greatly admired, and looking ahead to the future role of women in a rapidly changing society, Giorgio invented a different kind of women’s jacket that won immediately success. It was a translation of the men’s jacket: using traditional masculine fabrics and constructed with the same flowing line, though the proportions were changed, it conferred an unprecedented authority on the female figure.
p.65 – Success came quickly. The company, founded with capital of 10 million lire (roughly $10,000) in 1975, earned 80 million lire (roughly $80,000) with its first menswear collection and 30 million lire (roughly $30,000) with the first womenswear collection. Just one year later, its turnover increased to 569 million lire (over $500,000); ten years later, in 1985, it had swollen to 291 bilion lire, about $300,000 million).
p.66 – “America understood the importance of Giorgio Armani before anyone else because it was a country with a pioneering spirit, where women suddenly found themselves in the workplace where they needed a new kind of armor.” (Natalia Aspesi) They needed clothing suitable for the office, but they wanted it to be attractive, too. Armani understood the new demand his fashion fulfilled, stating in an interview with an Italian magazine, talking about his jackets: “I really do hope that they have given women a tone of relaxed confidence and the healthy sensation of being invulnerable,” adding that he further hoped the women who wore his clothes felt a little safer from the leering impertinence of men.
p.77 – On April 4, 1978, in Hollywood, Diane Keaton accepted her Best Actress Oscar for her role in Woody Allen’s Annie Hall wearing an Armani jackets.
p.78 – The Armani jacket became a full-fledged status symbol. John Travolta, whose first moment of major stardom came in the late seventies with his hits Saturday Night Fever and Grease, visited the Giorgio Armani atelier in Milan to select some forty suits that would be part of the wardrobe for American Gigolo (1980), in which he was supposed to star. (Travolta’s manager Bob Le Mond – already a passionate Armani fan – had persuaded director Paul Schrader that this new Italian style would word effectively in the movie.) But Travolta made the fatal misstep of turning down the role (opting instead to star in Urban Cowboy) and the part went to Richard Gere, costarring with Lauren Hutton – who would in time become a close friend and frequent spokesperson for Armani.
Perhaps the most influential was the famous scene in which Gere choses his outfit for the evening. Moving to the rhythm of a driving beat, he selects his ensemble with scientific precision from among his considerable array of jackets, shirts, and ties in a hitherto-unseen palette of harmonious colors. It was an image that became a billboard for the Armani style. The shadiness of the leading character was not just tempered by the confidently consistent aesthetic of his clothing, it was even ennobled to some extent. The suits, the accessories, the entire look belonged to an entirely new visual language. The shoulders – broad yet not stiff – the narrow lapels and waist, the softness of the fabrics, and the sense of restrained indulgence in the tailoring, all perfectly expressed the idea of sensuality.
p.79 – Armani rejected the label of designer to the stars: “I like to create clothing for people who work, and that includes actors and actresses, inasmuch as they are people who work, and not just as stars. I don’t want to become a dictator who imposes his likes and dislikes at all costs. I don’t believe that fashion should be a form of slavery. Wearing clothing should, however, be fun and reassuring, a way of feeling comfortable and confident,” he said.
p.81 – Nowadays, every designer vies to dress the stars of Hollywood, but for many years their wardrobes were the exclusive territory of Giorgio Armani. He was the first Italian designer to attract a genuine international following.
p.86 – This intense period saw, on the one hand, Thatcherism and the Falkland War and, on the other, glittering runway presentations, the punks in Kings Road, and the first New York graffiti artists.
p.191 – “Generally speaking, people use sexy to mean a style that reveals or shows off. I think that sexy is something different: for instance, a woman revealing a little of her boson beneath a man’s jacket. The sex appeal that most people talk about is much more open and much cheaper. Instead, I think showing your breasts isn’t sexy, I think little gestures that women make are sexy. The way they cross their legs, how they turn up their lapels or uncover an arm. I try to avoid the obvious, the cheap, the garish, the excessively simple, clear, or facile. On the contrary, I want to send subtler messages to my audience, I want to allow people to live as freely as they wish with the clothing that I offer.”
August 2, 2022
Apdovanotas ne tik talentu, bet ir įvairiausiomis nominacijos ir nuopelnais, atsidavęs darbui, kūrybinga ir išskirtinė asmenybė, kaip ir jo kelias mados pasaulyje.
Deja, knyga pasirodė ne tokia įdomi, kaip pati asmenybė. Galbūt labiau besidomintiems mada, ši knyga pasirodytų be galo įdomi.
Knygoje buvo užsiminta, kad Armani savo asmeninio gyvenimo neviešina (juk jis asmeninis), bet būtent smulkesnių detalių atskleidžiančių dizainerį, kaip asmenybę, šioje knygoje ir trūko.
Deja, knyga pasirodė ne tokia įdomi, kaip pati asmenybė. Galbūt labiau besidomintiems mada, ši knyga pasirodytų be galo įdomi.
Knygoje buvo užsiminta, kad Armani savo asmeninio gyvenimo neviešina (juk jis asmeninis), bet būtent smulkesnių detalių atskleidžiančių dizainerį, kaip asmenybę, šioje knygoje ir trūko.
September 17, 2017
Avab päris hästi Armani maailma telgitagused. Huvitav ja nauditav lugemine, eriti kellegile kes on huvitatud moest!
September 5, 2022
Добра биографична книга, която проследява историята от самото начало... не е натрапено единствено и само главното лице има и други истори.
November 13, 2008
"There must be something more."
"Where things were black or white; there was a left and right."
"Where things were black or white; there was a left and right."
October 14, 2012
Interesting facts, but ultimately poorly written and jumps all over the place
December 9, 2013
Undoubtedly an interesting subject, but written poorly snd superficially which beeaks the spell.
February 4, 2014
"išreikšti pojūčius, o ne juos sukurti/.../ juslingumas, o ne seksualumas"
December 26, 2016
This is one of the worst written bio, I have ever read, but still some nice facts about Armani life, his character and work.
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews