One of the last remaining titans of fashion has fallen. Valentino Garavani, the Italian fashion designer famous for his beautiful red dresses, died on Monday at the age of 93. He passed away in his home in Rome, surrounded by his loved ones.
Today, the name “Valentino” is known the world over, carrying connotations of elegance and luxury. Valentino Garavani was one of the first Italian designers to be embraced by the rarefied world of Parisian haute couture. Together with his peers like Gianni Versace and Giorgio Armani (who passed last year), Valentino helped to establish a vision of Italian glamour and style that continues to seduce and inspire us today.
Valentino Garavani founded his eponymous fashion label in Rome in 1959, and in the five decades that followed, he devoted himself to creating beauty. In Valentino’s haute couture and ready-to-wear collections, beauty often came in the form of evening gowns and cocktail dresses cut from silk and lace, and adorned with romantic flourishes like chiffon ruffles and bows. (Designer Pierpaolo Piccioli, who served as creative director of Valentino’s fashion label for 16 years, wrote in his touching tribute to the couturier, “You taught me how to make the most beautiful bows in the world.”)
Valentino, who was instantly recognisable with his tan skin and full head of hair, went by many names: he was dubbed the “the Sheik of chic” by the influential WWD editor-in-chief John Fairchild, and later the “Last Emperor” of fashion, after the title of a documentary film that chronicled his final years in the fashion industry.
Valentino was also known as “Vava” to the rich and famous women who adored him. Hollywood stars, first ladies, royalty and socialites all turned to the fashion designer to dress them up for their most important affairs, be it red carpet events, glitzy galas or even their wedding days. That Valentino attracted such an impressive and loyal clientele came down to one thing, as the designer himself put in the aforementioned documentary: “I know what women want. They want to be beautiful.”
Ahead, we spotlight some of the stylish women who turned to Valentino Garavani when they wanted to be elegant, sensational and simply beautiful.
Jackie Kennedy
Jackie Kennedy’s love affair with Valentino began in 1964, when she encountered his couture creations in New York. The former first lady ordered six dresses from the Italian designer, which she wore while she mourned her husband, the former US president John F. Kennedy. In 1968, Jackie O would again put Valentino in the spotlight at her second wedding, to Aristotle Onassis. The bride wore a chantilly lace blouse with bishop sleeves and a matching knee-length pleated skirt—an ensemble from Valentino’s all-white Spring/Summer 1968 haute couture collection which she owned and loved.
Princess Diana
As far as the fashion world is concerned, Valentino invented the colour red—specifically, the bright, poppy red shade that has appeared on a dress in every single one of his collections, up until his retirement in 2008. One such dress was worn by Princess Diana when she attended Paul McCartney’s performance of Liverpool Oratorio in France in November 1992. It was a bold look for the Princess of Wales: the lace and velvet Valentino dress emphasised her figure and flaunted her décolletage and long legs. A month later, her separation from Prince Charles would be announced, making this Valentino dress something of a precursor to her famous “revenge dress” in 1994. And how fitting. “I think a woman dressed in red is always wonderful, she is the perfect image of a heroine,” Valentino once wrote.
Gwyneth Paltrow
“I was so lucky to know and love Valentino—to know the real man, in private,” wrote Gwyneth Paltrow in her tribute to the Italian designer on Instagram. Over the last two decades, the Goop founder has often shown her support for Valentino through her red carpet looks. Paltrow attended the opening night of the 2002 Venice Film Festival wearing one of his sheer lace dresses, with the designer himself on her arm. You might remember the black and white gown with tulle sleeves, from Valentino’s Fall/Winter 1963 haute couture collection, that Paltrow wore to the 2019 Emmy Awards. At the 2023 Fashion Awards, the actress, known for her minimalist style and penchant for neutral colours, even donned Valentino red. “He has always been there for me the way he’s been there for the world of fashion,” Paltrow said in a speech at the awards. “Tonight, I wear red for Mr Valentino.”
Anne Hathaway
Like Paltrow, Anne Hathaway is another Hollywood A-lister who shared a close bond with Valentino. The pair met on the set of The Devil Wears Prada, where Valentino filmed a cameo. After that meeting, Hathaway would wear Valentino’s haute couture creations to film premieres, red carpet events like the Oscars and the Met Gala, and even her wedding to Adam Schulman in 2012. Valentino created an ivory silk point tulle gown for Hathaway’s big day, which she described as “the most important dress I would ever wear” at the 2025 WWD Honors event. When the actress honoured Valentino at the event with an award, she naturally wore one of his designs: a bright red gown with knotted shoulder straps and a ruffled skirt, from Valentino’s Fall/Winter 2003 haute couture collection.
Zendaya
In 2022, Zendaya went viral when she attended the premiere of the second season of Euphoria in a striped, black and white vintage Valentino dress. The gown was last worn by supermodel Linda Evangelista at Valentino’s Spring/Summer 1992 fashion show. On Zendaya, it proved one thing: that the appeal of Valentino Garavani’s gowns transcends generations.
Note : The information in this article is accurate as of the date of publication.
