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Valentino: 10 things you didn't know
Fashion legend Valentino celebrates 45 years of making women look and feel beautiful.
By Rebecca Lowthorpe
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5. His food
"Believe me, I'm a pain in the neck when it comes to food," he says. "It's not nice to be like I am. Some people are more relaxed: they travel and eat everything -- they don't care if it's spicy or if there's garlic in their food. I'm too much of a pain in the neck: I don't eat this, and I don't eat that!" His ideal meal is a simple plate of spaghetti with tomato sauce, a dish that he cooked himself when he appeared on The Martha Stewart Show last year.
6. His drugs
"I'm a very safe person who loves his eight hours of sleep," he says. "I don't drink, and I don't smoke. I've never taken drugs in my life -- not in my entire life. I was strong enough in New York in the '70s, when everybody was up here," he says, pointing to the ceiling and rolling his eyes, as if imitating someone on a high. "I was just alone sometimes because everybody was in their rooms, locked up, smoking and sniffing. It never appealed to me. And they tried so hard to get me interested, saying 'Try, try, try to smoke a joint.' But I never did because, I don't know, maybe I was scared I'd like it. I never wanted to lose my head."
7. Dressing celebrities and royals
"All the young, beautiful princesses love to be well dressed now, to be glamorous," he says. "They're not like they were in the past: very conservative, in a very boring way. But, of course, there's a difference between that and the red carpet. For movie stars now, the more skin you show, the more beautiful the dress is." A steady stream of famous women have made their way to Valentino since 1959, when, at the age of 27, he opened his studio in a luxurious Roman apartment on Via dei Condotti at the foot of the Spanish Steps. In the early days, it was former First Lady and fashion pin-up Jackie Kennedy; today, it's Jennifer
Aniston, Julia Roberts and Jennifer Lopez. Meryl Streep is a "very close friend," as is Gwyneth Paltrow, whose daughter, Apple, is Valentino's goddaughter.
8. His fashions and fashion friends
If there's one subject Valentino hates to talk about when he's not working, it's fashion. "Oh, my gosh, I have lots of colleagues whom I love very much, but they speak about clothes and fashion every minute of their lives," he says. "I would kill myself!" So, does he have any fashion buddies? "Of course, I know everybody [in fashion] when we see each other. But close friends? No. Maybe the closest one is Tom Ford." In fact, he says Ford is the one designer to whom he would hand over the reins of his company when he retires. "Maybe. I told him 'I think you would be the only one.'"
9. His money
"I never have a penny in my pocket," he says.
10. His image
Is it important for a designer to have an instantly recognizable image? "I don't know, but this is the way I comb my hair all the time -- it never changes." What about his trademark tan? "When I don't have [the sun], I use a sun lamp," he says. "I like to look healthy. For a woman, it's nice to be pale. But for a man to be so white, so sickly looking, I don't like it."
Related articles:
Top notch: Floaty blouses for spring
Spring/Summer 2008 runway fashion report
Top 10 fashion must-haves for 2008
Image courtesy of Valentino archive
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