THE FRIDA ERA

FRIDA GIANNINI is making fashion history as we speak. In her ninth year at the house of Gucci, the creative director is writing a new chapter. VIVIENNE TANG travels to Rome to speak to the Italian designer about creating an era of her own

THIS YEAR MARKS Gucci’s 90th anniversary, and Frida Giannini has her fingers in many pies. She’s juggling ready-to-wear collections and accessories, has recently designed a boat, launched a new personalization programme for leather goods and developed a new kids’ line. She works hand-in-hand with celebrities on initiatives for Unicef, orchestrating advertising campaigns that feature many famous faces. And she sits on the board of directors of French luxury goods multinational PPR’s Foundation for Women’s Dignity and Rights, as well as having introduced a worldwide eco-friendly initiative for Gucci to reduce paper consumption and CO2 emissions last year. But Giannini isn’t resting on her laurels. Her projects and interests reach beyond fashion, taking advantage of the Gucci brand’s influence and utilising it in other creative areas such as cinema. At her behest, the house joined forces with Martin Scorsese’s The Film Foundation in 2006 to restore old film classics (six so far). And to celebrate the brand’s 90th birthday, this female superhero of the fashion world will be taking on the music industry.

I meet Giannini at the luxurious Rome Cavalieri hotel, which sits in lush parkland atop a hill overlooking the Italian capital. Comfortably seated on a sofa, she looks serious and determined with her slight but toned frame, long slender face and straight ginger-tinted hair. She’s just turned 38 years old.

“I was a little bit nervous, but now everything is under control. I feel much more relaxed,” Giannini says in a deep, throaty voice, referring to tonight’s film debut of the restored La Dolce Vita. “Actually we have several plans for the 90th anniversary. We’re planning a new collaboration with the Grammys. It’s similar to the film foundation. We want to recuperate some old tracks and vinyl that are very damaged.” She refuses to be drawn on specifics for the Grammys project. “The important thing is that it’s music that touches me and that makes me feel alive,” she says.

It’s not Giannini’s first foray into the music world. She owns 8,000 records, mainly inherited from her DJ uncle, and she teamed up with producer and musician Mark Ronson for a sneaker collection and pop-up store in 2009, while charity-related Gucci projects with Madonna, Rihanna and Mary J Blige (with whom she often hobnobs at parties), as well as the recruitment of Jennifer Lopez and her children for the kids campaign, can all be credited to her passion for music. And she’s closely involved in creating the soundtracks to her shows.

“I always feel comfortable with them, probably more than with fashion people,” the designer says about her musician friends. “They feel closer to my soul. With the fashion shows, I work in advance with the music designer. I give him the inputs of the collection – the mood, the feeling. And he’ll get back to me with several tracks, and during the week before the fashion show, we spend a couple of hours together every day.”

Other projects for this year include a line of limited-edition products – still in the design process – and the Gucci museum, which is slated to open soon. “We’re working to set a very special environment, very special content,” she says. “We don’t want to do something very nostalgic. We want to create this balance, which I’m always doing in my job – what was yesterday, what is today and what will be tomorrow.”

The Roman born and bred Fendi alumna – she worked under Lagerfeld for six years, where she invented, arguably the very first “It” bag, the Baguette – joined Gucci in 2002 as an accessories designer. But the self-proclaimed control freak, who’s not one to sit back while others get their hands dirty, had much to prove upon her arrival at the fashion house.

It wasn’t so long ago that the house of Gucci was still a family-owned business, with icons such as Audrey Hepburn and Jackie Onassis catapulting the label to the height of 1960s and ’70s fashion chic. Only a decade later, after a few disastrous business decisions and family feuds – boardroom meetings degenerated into fistfights, with answering machines and ashtrays as weapons – the once premier luxury brand had lost its lustre. That fall from grace, involving Machiavellian family intrigues and murder, is a possible film project-in-the-making for director Ridley Scott. Giannini, however, says she’s never met a Gucci family member.

It wasn’t until the ’90s that the almost bankrupt fashion house received a makeover, as Tom Ford initiated a Gucci revival with a string of raunchy campaigns and a “sex sells” attitude; one advert even pictured model Carmen Kass with her knickers pulled down to show off her pubic hair shaved into the letter “G.” The brand thrived on Ford’s risqué influence, but after his sudden 2004 departure it plunged into crisis. Successors from within the company were named to follow in Ford’s footsteps – Alessandra Facchinetti for womenswear, John Ray for menswear and Frida Giannini for accessories. None of them lasted except Giannini, and she’s been on a dizzying ascent ever since, taking on womenswear in 2005 and menswear a year later.

“The brand has changed its vision, because of course now there’s a female vision,” she answers nonchalantly when quizzed about her predecessor. “I have and I had huge respect for Tom Ford, because I think he did an amazing job in the ’90s, and he really revamped Gucci from the dust of the ’80s. He was very smart in translating the Italian Gucci brand into an international brand. So I wanted to keep this, but then, of course, I also wanted to look forward, with my personality in mind, infusing myself every day in everything that I’m doing. It’s changed, especially when we talk about Gucci – Sex – Gucci. Not today. We talk more about sensuality. It’s a different approach. I have a different opinion on certain things. I think that I am also more interested in other things, not just in designing clothes. And I think it’s something that enriches your role as a designer. You need to fight for your ideas, always. I really believe in what I’m doing, even moreso when I received – probably more in the past than today – tough reviews or criticism.”

In a fashion industry run mainly by men, it’s unusual to see a woman who’s experienced Giannini’s amount of success (she even managed to convince Gucci to move its headquarters from Florence to Rome) over such a short period of time. And yes, she did go through her share of harsh criticism. She was accused of dumping the G-spot for a more playful look, and some reviews even sneered that her idea of fun was cooking pasta at home for her friends, but Giannini doesn’t hold a grudge. “I feel calm, because I feel confident with the results,” she says convincingly. “I see the final results in the store. I always say, ‘I’m not an architect that’s only painting a wall, but I’m doing a job for people who want to buy clothes and bags, people who want to buy that dream.’ And when I see people with my creations, I think that’s the best achievement and the best satisfaction for a designer. When someone is talented, the sex is not important.”

Giannini guards her private life jealously, but admits to enjoying mundane pleasures such as cooking and walking the dog. “It grounds me,” she says, “because flying, travelling and working all day, changing your language every minute – sometimes I just really need to have a normal life, go to the market and buy fresh vegetables, fresh meat and fish, simple things like that.”

As fashion becomes more demanding and collections multiply, Giannini’s schedule seems to become tighter too. “I would love to have more time to develop my overall idea of the Gucci world and sort of create a Frida era,” she reveals. “And I would love to have more time for myself, more time for massage, more time for my family. I would like to have a baby one day and my own family.”

Having an amazing family and calling the shots at a fashion empire like Gucci – in Frida’s era, everything is possible.