Roberto Cavalli, the £400m designer to the stars, dies at 83
FASHION designer Roberto Cavalli, famed for his flamboyant animal prints and sandblasted denim, has died in Florence at the age of 83.
Adored by celebrities from Taylor Swift to Madonna, his exotic and flashy style – often inspired by flora and fauna – was a hallmark of hedonistic Nineties fashion and earned him a £400million fortune.
The glamorous, twice-married Italian, who had a Batmaninspired superyacht and a leopard-print bedroom, also enjoyed an enduringly colourful lifestyle: he became a father for the sixth time with his Playboy model partner Sandra Nilsson last year.
Swedish pin-up Nilsson, the magazine’s Playmate of the Month in January 2008, was 45 years his junior.
Cavalli died on Friday from an undisclosed illness, his company, Roberto Cavalli Maison, announced. ‘From humble beginnings in Florence, Roberto succeeded in becoming a globally recognised name loved and respected by all,’ it said in a statement. ‘His legacy will live on via his creativity, his love of nature and via his family, who he cherished.’
Born in a small village in Tuscany to a seamstress mother, Cavalli rose to fame in the 1970s with outfits including a pink leather evening gown, which was part of his debut collection in Paris. This led to commissions from Hermes and Pierre Cardin. He later turned his hand to denim and worked with Lycra to create the first stretchy jeans.
But it was during the Nineties that his brand took off, thanks to A-listers such as Britney Spears and Jennifer Lopez who began wearing his diamante-studded, low-slung waistline designs.
Ms Swift recently turned to Cavalli for several custom-made outfits for her Eras tour, including an asymmetric black and red catsuit, while Beyoncé wore a yellow Cavalli gown for the launch of her album Lemonade in 2016.
Tributes were paid to Cavalli yesterday from across the fashion and celebrity world. In a statement on X, formerly Twitter, Giorgio Armani wrote that he was a ‘true artist’ who was ‘capable of transforming fantasy into seductive clothes’ while Victoria Beckham said he would ‘forever be an icon’.