Dolce & Gabbana is an Italian high fashion house, founded in Legnano in 1985 by the designers Domenico Dolce and Stefano Gabbana. The brand enjoys worldwide fame thanks to its aesthetics, purely inspired by "Italianness", thanks to its presence in the many world markets and also thanks to the well-known faces that make it a testimonial. Must-have are fancy dresses, leather bags, formal suits for men but also sneakers and shoes, accessories and the junior line.
The winning combination of Dolce's tailoring perfectionism and Gabbana's stylistic theatrical design has made the brand a powerhouse of today's obsessed from celebrity power and has made it so influential as ambassador of sports, music and cinema, for which they create clothing.
Domenico Dolce was born in 1958 by Sicilian parents; his father, who was a tailor in Palermo, began teaching him to sew jackets since the age of seven. Stefano Gabbana, born in 1962, is son of a milan typographer.
It was Sicily, Dolce's origin place, loved by Gabbana for his childhood holidays, to seal the bond between the two from their first encounter and to refer to the aesthetic features of the brand: the typical Sicilian girl, the Mediterranean temptress and the Sicilian bandit. And it is precisely the contrast between these opposites (male/female, delicate/virile and innocen/corrupt), that makes Dolce&Gabbana so interesting.
Dolce and Gabbana are considered the inventors of a Mediterranean style that draws its inspiration from the Sicily of Luchino Visconti's 1963 film "The Leopard" and the women of Italian realism, sensual and austere like Anna Magnani, to whom they dedicated a collection. At the beginning of their career, the designers also turned to Sophia Loren, Claudia Cardinale, and Stefania Sandrelli for inspiration.
The Dolce&Gabbana woman is unbiased and brazen, but fearful of God and devoted to church and family, an attitude typical of southern Italian Catholicism. A woman, who simultaneously reveals and conceals brassieres and corsets, lace, lingerie, and veils and, who is disturbing in her impetuous sensuality - a provocative woman proud of her body.
In an age, when fashion saw women dressing up as women in suits with padded shoulders, the first Dolce & Gabbana collection included tulle and angora, twin-set in jersey, wide and extravagant skirts. At the time, their favorite materials were lace, wool and silk.
The turning point in their international success began with their friendship with Madonna. The pop-star ordered from their New York showroom a guêpière made of gemstones and a jacket to wear at Cannes to launch her film "Truth or Dare: In Bed with Madonna" by Alek Keshishian (1990). Madonna's participation in the 1992 Dolce&Gabbana party and runway show, confirmed their friendship. Shortly after, the singer asked them to design the fifteen hundred costumes for her 1993 "Girlie Show" tour.
The empire, which includes Alta Sartoria e Pret-à-porter lines, distributes clothing, bathing suits, glasses and scents throughout the world through its boutique network.
