Valentino Garavani ✝

Valentino Clemente Ludovico Garavani (born 11 May 1932), best known as Valentino, is an Italian fashion designer and founder of the Valentino SpA brand and company. His main lines include Valentino, Valentino Garavani, Valentino Roma, and R.E.D. Valentino.\n', ' Valentino was born in Voghera, in the province of Pavia, Lombardy, Italy. His mother named him after her screen idol Rudolph Valentino. He became interested in fashion while in primary school in his native Voghera, Lombardy, northern Italy, when he apprenticed under his aunt Rosa and local designer Ernestina Salvadeo, an aunt of noted artist Aldo Giorgini. Valentino then moved to Paris to pursue this interest with the help of his mother Teresa de Biaggi and his father Mauro Garavani. There he studied at the École des Beaux-Arts and at the Chambre Syndicale de la Couture Parisienne.[citation needed]\n', ' \n', 'His first choice for an apprenticeship, in Paris, was Jacques Fath, then Balenciaga. He found an apprenticeship with Jean Dessès where he helped Countess Jacqueline de Ribes sketch her dress ideas. He then joined Guy Laroche for two years. At Jean Dessès, Valentino sketched furiously, between helping with window dressing and greeting clients for the daily 2:30 pm private showings.[citation needed] Most of his early sketches were lost.[citation needed] However, at a Rome exhibition in 1991 a smattering of them went on display and then-current clients such as Marie-Hélène de Rothschild and Elizabeth Taylor marveled that the DNA of Valentino\'s style was already apparent in the layers of white pleats and animal prints.