The backdrop to the Italian fall-winter 2000 season, which runs through this week, is the shift to corporate, global business by companies that were founded as family affairs. Events are dominated by the battle for the heart and shoe soles of Gucci. In Italy we have Benetton, Zegna, Ferragamo, Max Mara - they are all family companies. But you see what happened at Valentino.
Financial investment is so important to growth.
That is the uncomfortable truth about most Italian designers, who have not yet turned the name into a brand and still tend to search for a successor within the family - as the Missonis have handed over to daughter Angela. An infusion of overseas talent into existing houses has been one way of making up for the paucity of design skill at home. The 1990s have seen the arrival of designers, mostly American, heading the studios of commercial and industrial fashion houses. A new arrival this season is Josephus Thimister at Genny. Sometimes these shows work fine.