Alessandro Michele Takes the Helm as Valentino’s New Creative Director
Alessandro Michele has been announced as the new creative director of Valentino, marking the end of a year of speculation following his departure from Gucci. Michele is set to begin his role at the prestigious Rome-based fashion house on April 2, with his first collection, Spring/Summer 2025, expected to debut at Paris Fashion Week in September. Describing his appointment as an “incredible honour,” Michele expressed his excitement and the immense responsibility he feels joining a house known for its elegance and grace.
Michele’s new role will see him working from the Valentino studio in Palazzo Mignanelli, near the Spanish Steps, where he will design couture collections for the first time. His appointment reunites him with Valentino’s CEO, Jacopo Venturini, a former colleague at Gucci. Venturini praised Michele for his profound intelligence and creativity, expressing confidence in Michele’s ability to blend Valentino’s heritage with his unique vision to create highly desirable fashion pieces.
This move is significant for the fashion industry, especially given Michele’s successful tenure at Gucci, where he was credited with dramatically increasing the brand’s revenues. His new position at Valentino is part of a larger narrative involving strategic investments and partnerships between major fashion conglomerates, potentially positioning Valentino for substantial future growth under Michele’s creative leadership.
Valentino’s chairman, Rachid Mohamed Rachid, and Kering’s chairman and CEO, François-Henri Pinault, both lauded Michele’s appointment, highlighting his exceptional talent and the bright future his creative direction promises for Valentino. Michele’s vision for the brand emphasizes beauty without boundaries, reflecting his inclusive and intellectual approach to fashion. As he embarks on this new chapter, Michele remains grounded in his Roman roots, ready to infuse Valentino with his distinctive flair and creativity.
Michele said the following, “It’s an incredible honour for me to be welcomed at Maison Valentino. I feel the immense joy and the huge responsibility to join a Maison de Couture that has the word ‘beauty’ carved on a collective story, made of distinctive elegance, refinement and extreme grace.
My first thought goes to this story: to the richness of its cultural and symbolic heritage, to the sense of wonder it constantly generates, to the very precious identity given with their wildest love by founding fathers, Valentino Garavani and Giancarlo Giammetti. These references always represented an essential source of inspiration for me, and I’m going to praise such influence through my own interpretation and creative vision.
My heartfelt gratitude, of course, goes to Rachid Mohamed Rachid who gave me this unique and irreplicable occasion. His trust is a gift of the soul that I will try to cherish with my work and total devotion.
My thankfulness to Jacopo Venturini is boundless, limitless. Getting back to work with him is a marvelous dream come true. Jacopo is not only an extraordinary professional, able to combine pragmatism and strategic vision, competence and sensibility. He’s most of all a man who is able to celebrate falling in love with life every day, through his passions and his care.
Today, I search for words to nominate the joy, to regard it, to really convey what I feel: the smiles that kick from the chest, the bliss of gratitude that lights up the eyes, that precious moment when necessity and beauty reach out and meet. Joy, though, is such a living thing that I’m afraid to hurt it if I dare to speak its name.
May my bow, wide open arms, speak for itself and salute in this early spring the regeneration of life and the promise of new blooming.”