Fashion and life style the Italian way in London

Defined as a “photographic celebration of the Italian lifestyle”, Miss Italy opens on the 21st of September at the Hulton Getty Picture Gallery in Chelsea, in time for the London Fashion Week.

As the productive combination of Mark Getty’s media business, specialised in digital image processing, and the fashion label launched by his wife Domitilla, the exhibition, open until the 21st of October, consists of a wide choice of glamorous pictures portraying scenes and characters of stylish Italian life , the “Dolce Vita” approach. These photographs reflect the spirit of her “Miss Italy” clothes and create a perfect background for their parade on the night of the inauguration.

“It’s a homage to an Italy which perhaps today does not exist anymore, but which has made my generation dream,” says Mrs. Getty, which divides her year between London and the hills around Siena. “I’ve particularly chosen pictures which illustrate the ‘glamorous moments” which my mother and my grandmothers experienced and which I try to reproduce in the designs and the textures of my collection, using traditional fabrics, woven fabrics, always made in Italy.”.

Indeed, those mentioned ladies knew a few things about fashion and social life, with all the charisma and eccentricity of a prestigious aristocratic dynasty such as that of the Ruspoli family: the regal picture of the Mrs. Getty’s namesake aunt beautiful people in splendid environments, in artistic contrast to more “popular” and picturesque images of the Italy of the “rebirth”, symbolically dotted with the triumphs of pasta and ice cream, with everything from coffee in the open to youths on scooters.

“My grandmothers had a great influence on me”, Mrs. Getty continues, “This idea of Miss Italy had a lot to do with my paternal grandmother, who, on arriving from Illinois, became enthusiastically caught up in the Italian atmosphere, to the extent of writing a book entitled ‘Dear Friends and Darling Romans’ which celebrated the fabulous 60s in Italy. My other grandmother, on the other hand, loved archaeology but above all the elegant, tailor-suited clothes which she designed herself”. With such precedents, it hardly comes as a surprise that their niece should launch her own fashion label, although she stipulates that she doesn’t follow the ever-changing dictates of fashion: “My collections may appear somewhat repetitive, but I don’t see why I should change and create something which is not equally beautiful”.

Given the success obtained in Los Angeles, New York and Tokyo, plans are in progress for a perfume and a Miss Italy for Men collection. Mr. Getty, whose memories of Rome are probably blemished by the dramatic kidnapping of his brother Paul, who had an ear cut off by the kidnappers to induce his millionaire grandfather to pay the ransom, does not occupy himself with the fashion but rather with his successful media business Getty Images and it is very proper that for a month the Hulton Getty Picture Gallery will glow with intense images of Italian tradition, culture, style and sensuality, from which Miss Italy draws its inspiration.

Author: Margherita Calderoni