Frida Giannini - Designer

[khyrk]

Gucci is cleaning house.

According to multiple fashion insiders, the luxury brand’s CEO Patrizio di Marco and creative director Frida Giannini will exit in an announcement made as soon as Thursday, sources exclusively tell Page Six. (The colleagues are also a couple who have a daughter together.)

Michele Sofisti, the CEO of Gucci’s watches and jewelry division, left last week.

Sales at the beleaguered brand have been stagnant, and in October Gucci posted its weakest quarterly growth for four years.

The fashion world has been buzzing for months that di Marco would be out after the brand’s bottom line has reportedly been hit by over-expansion in China as well as repositioning itself as more exclusive line by moving away from its logo-heavy product that was popular in the 2000s.

Di Marco has been with Gucci since 2009 after coming over from Bottega Veneta, which is also owned by Gucci parent Kering. Giannini joined in 2002 from Fendi.

François-Henri Pinault’s Kering also owns brands including Alexander McQueen, Saint Laurent and Puma. Reps for Gucci did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

pagesix

 

[TREVOFASHIONISTO]

if its true, i will be very pleased. Gucci has become stale over the past years. This is a house that needs to shake things up

 

[StoneSkipper]

~The prophecy is being fulfilled~

I don't dislike what Frida's doing, but change is good. I'm excited to see what unravels of this.

 

[testinofan]

Finally Frida OUT!! Gucci need back to the Tom Ford era!!

 

[VersaceVixen009]

It'll be interesting to see where Gucci will go from here. She definitely has been in a creative rut for a few years, but let's not forget for a few years, we were singing her praises for her rock n roll minidresses, gowns and accessories. She brought back the original conservative side to Gucci, which no one knew existed. She really did succeed in the beginning. She definitely achieved a lot accessory wise.

 

[zacatecas570]

Marco Bizzarri will take Frida Giannini's place at Gucci and Frida's last collection will be in February.

 

[Benn98]

Fida giannini is leaving gucci

CEO and creative director to leave Gucci
Marco Bizzari©Reuters

Gucci, the Italian luxury goods brand, is parting company with its chief executive Patrizio di Marco and his partner, the brand’s creative director, Frida Giannini, according to its owner, the French group Kering.

The departure comes after more than a year of speculation that Mr di Marco and Ms Giannini would leave as they failed to stem falling sales at the brand that makes up half of Kering’s revenues.

Mr di Marco will be replaced by Marco Bizzarri, former head of Bottega Veneta who was earlier this year made head of Kering’s luxury division excluding Gucci. Kering said it will make an announcement about Ms Giannini’s replacement next year.

Mr de Marco will leave on January 1 after 13 years with Kering and Ms Giannini will step down at the end of February, after presenting her Fall/Winter 2015-16 womenswear collection. She has been with Kering and Gucci for more than 12 years.

In October, Gucci reported another weak quarter of growth in four years despite a much trailed relaunch of its high margin leather goods business.

Gucci sales fell to €851m between July and the end of September, a 1.9 per cent fall compared to the same period a year ago.

The exit of Mr di Marco and Ms Giannini comes amid a period of upheaval for the European luxury industry as sales to Chinese consumers that have been the driver of the industry’s rapid growth for a decade slow because by an anti-corruption clampdown by Beijing.

Changing consumer habits in the US and Europe are also hitting luxury’s biggest brands as shoppers increasingly buy online and amid a trend towards buying smaller, less well-known labels rather than recognisable brands such as Gucci and Prada, another luxury brand where sales have slowed rapidly over the past year.

Reflecting the uncertainty in the industry, Prada said in a statement last week that "the luxury goods market is undergoing a certain readjustment, the extent and nature of which is not entirely clear yet".

In response to the upheaval, there has been a shake-up of senior executives in the industry of which the exit of Mr di Marco and Ms Giannini is the most high profile.

Luxury groups, such as LVMH and Kering are also snapping up emerging labels as they seek to offset slowing sales at their most recognisable brands. LVMH last year bought a stake in Italian young designer Marco di Vincenzo and Kering took ownership of Milanese cult jewellery Pomellato.

Nevertheless, some commentators remain sceptical about the industry's response.

Mimma Viglezio, an independent creative consultant to the fashion industry and former Gucci executive, said she was "convinced that there is a huge change going on and that the industry is not adapting fast enough".

"Young people are less pushed towards luxury and branding, they are a little bit tired of looking the same," she said.

Source: Financial Times.com

 

[Flashbang]

Kering SA (KER) said Gucci Chief Executive Officer Patrizio di Marco and Creative Director Frida Giannini plan to leave the fashion maker’s biggest luxury brand.

Marco Bizzarri, head of the parent company’s luxury-couture and leather goods division, will take over running Gucci on Jan. 1, Kering said today in a statement. Giannini will depart at the end of February after showing her fall-winter collection, and a successor will be named later.

Gucci has struggled as customers switch to labels they perceive to be more exclusive. Comparable revenue fell 1.9 percent in the third quarter, though the company has said it’s confident of returning to positive trends in the near future.

“I truly enjoyed working with Patrizio,” Kering CEO Francois-Henri Pinault said in the statement.

Di Marco joined Gucci in 2009 from sister brand Bottega Veneta. He sought to move Gucci up-market by reducing the use of the label’s famous double G logo, narrowing the product range and re-introducing classic styles in luxurious materials. Giannini had led Gucci’s creative team since 2006.

Kering has been overhauling management of its luxury brands. In October, the Paris-based company named new CEOs at Bottega Veneta, Brioni and Christopher Kane.

bloomberg.com

 

[Koibito]

Finally!

 

[FashionFanatico]

This is great news!

 

[VERNIQUE]

Hooray! this is a good day for fashion.

i know it is a wish too far - but i would like to see
Christophe Lemaire bringing a more subtle luxury to Gucci.

 

[Koibito]

^I think that would be impossible cause he left Hermes just because he wanted to focus on his own brand.

 

[shanhuq]

wow such great news i wonder who's gonna replace her. i would love gucci to go back to something super sexy. nasir mazhar perhaps? hopefully its someone new and fresh

 

[DutchHomme]

Hallelujah

 

[squilliam]

Any thoughts on who might her replacement be?

 

[mistress_f]

lol it was about time. comes about a few years too late, but better than never. Now those rumors about her leaving and tisci taking her place gain a bit credibility, but i still find it very hard to believe

 

[Lola701]

She is leaving Gucci after 14 years and the brand was not influencial for at least 8 years. She did some good things and some bad things but she wasn't right for the job, even if her accessories were good.
I wonder what she will do next. She can do Saint Laurent better than Hedi!

IMO, Gucci needs to move on from the Tom Ford years...even more now that he is doing womenswear again. It can be still sexy but in a different way. I don't want someone like Frida who was looking into his archives. FW2014 was her version of his FW1995.
NO ALTUZARRA! NO PROENZA SCHOULER! NO, NO, NO! For god sake!

Marco de Vicenzo can do Gucci. He is young and creative. His work is slightly sexy. He can be inspired by the TF years and bring something new. Or Matthieu Blazy.
A change is always good in fashion!

 

[squilliam]

"Customers switch to labels they perceive to be more exclusive"
I never thought that Gucci was any less exclusive than say Louis Vuitton, the monogrammed merchandise both seem to be ubiquitous. I don't think they're gonna return to a tom ford era if they want to maintain an exclusive air for the brand, but then again they're not gonna go with Frida's approach either. I wonder what the new direction will be, but it's nice to hear that they want more creativity because the fashion world is in desperate need of new blood.

 

[anlabe32]

Well I, for one, think it's quite sad that she's leaving. She had ups and down but overall I think her collections were classy and from good quality (as it appeared).
Besides, i'm sooooo bored by that "I miss Tom Ford at Gucci"... Did anyone see the collections at his own label? They're tacky as hell and get lots of negative comments.

Gucci is a classy brand, not a sexy brand.

 

[gossiping]

i really loved her latest collections, bit of a shame but excited to see what happens next and where she will go