Venice honours Valentino
Venice has honoured Italian fashion designer Valentino with a special screening of a new film about his life.
Supermodel Eva Herzigova and actress Elizabeth Hurley were among the selected guests to the screening in one of Italy’s most celebrated venues, La Fenice opera house.
Valentino: The Last Emperor, is a fly-on-the-wall look at Valentino’s last two years at the helm of the fashion house he created in the 1960s.
The documentary follows Valentino when he held three days of lavish celebrations in Rome for the 45th anniversary of his group.
He retired in January 2008 after his last show in Paris, the culmination of months of speculation about his future as private equity firm Permira gradually took over his empire.
Valentino said he left with joy: “I left because I wanted to live a little and I did a lot in fashion. So, now I think about myself and do something that makes me feel, very, very, not too sad but that gives me joy, I’d like to do something that gives me lots of joy, maybe some costumes for the theatre.”
The designer said two of the highlights of his career was when Julia Roberts wore one of his gowns when accepting an Oscar for the film Erin Brokovich and meeting the Queen.
He said: “When I saw Julia Roberts with one of my vintages, I was quite touched because she looked sensational. It is a dress that I liked very very much in my past collection.
“And another moment, very very important, when the Queen of England, she looked at my clothes in one vitrine of the Victoria and Albert Museum and I met her, she complimented me, it was very touching.”
When asked if she missed seeing Valentino in the fashion world, supermodel Herzigova said that she saw more of him now than ever before: “I seem to see him more since he’s not a designer anymore, it’s like, he’s just been so busy, I think he’s going to keep even more busy.”
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