"I said to my father, 'Father, I would like a bag – not just a bag, a set of Fendi bags.' This was 1980s time, so logomania!" Dello Russo's hands spring into action, waving in the air as she spits out "F-F-F-F-F-F-F-F" like a fashion firearm to describe the Fendi initial-spotted zucca weave. Mamma would say, 'Please don't do that, it's not polite', but I would say, 'Mamma, I love the bag!'" The breakthrough fashion moment was indicative of Italian fashion in the 1980s. "I was always looking in the bag, look at the jewellery. Born in the Italian provincial town of Bari in 1962, she was a dedicated follower of fashion from her early years. My mother said, 'You want a pair of jeans?' and I said, 'No, mother, I want a couture dress!'"Īccording to Dello Russo, her childhood contained many gems like this. But I never liked easy clothes in my life. I don't go into the office I'm travelling around the world. They're not generally considered "daywear", but Dello Russo doesn't really do day. Generally, that means catwalk-hot, high-octane fashion – Dello Russo has a penchant for the glitzy, ritzy dresses created by Peter Dundas for Emilio Pucci and Christophe Decarnin at Balmain, short and encrusted with embroidery and glitter. The pieces people want to see in the future," she says. "All my money, all my passion goes into the best, the key pieces of fashion. This she sees not as an extravagance, but as an investment, both financially and culturally. Dello Russo has been collecting clothing for 20 years, keeping her ever-expanding wardrobe in a climate-controlled second apartment next door to her home in Milan. Those photographers, however, only gave visibility to something already brewing. Maybe it's because, by her own admission, her English is "no so good": her accent is as thick as carbonara sauce, punctuated with much extravagant gesturing and clanking of various items of jewellery. Her upfront nature is one of her most endearing qualities – and incredibly rare in fashion. They made a new career," Dello Russo states, matter-of-fact. Today, street-style bloggers have multiplied, but they all seem to remain enamoured by Dello Russo – her stride slows to a crawl as hundreds cluster to pap-snap her outfits between car and show as she does the rounds of the international capitals during fashion weeks. Anna Dello Russo is always ready for her close-up. Online, plugged in and turned on, she explodes the idea of the fashion editor being at least once removed from the general public. The final leap, never before made by any member of the fashion press, was on to the catwalk last year, modelling for the Lanvin/H&M fashion show in New York, and for Giles Deacon's first presentation for the Parisian house of Emanuel Ungaro – a neat inversion of the set that looks and the set that is looked at in the world of fashion. She blogs on and tweets during the shows, broadcasting her image over the internet and even across competitors' magazines (she was the lead editorial and cover-girl of last autumn's 10 magazine). But Dello Russo is another entity entirely – creative director and fashion consultant Ronnie Cooke Newhouse described her as an "insider fashion reality star", and she's in touch with her audience 24/7. We've seen hints before in the deification of US Vogue's Anna Wintour and the former French Vogue editor Carine Roitfeld, whose names have become known to people who never read the fashion pages, via prime-time documentaries and fictional characterisations galore. How many fashion editors do you know with their own eponymous fragrance – released by last year in a bejewelled shoe that was inspired by a Christmas-tree bauble? Actually, how many do you know with their own self-managed blog, or a retinue of staff whose email signature reads "Anna Dello Russo Factory"? It's easy to imagine Anna as a fictional character marching her Manolos through Funny Face or even Prêt-à-Porter, but this is what being a 21st-century fashion editor is all about – part celebrity, part caricature definitely larger than life. You should put your passion on yourself before translating to other people."ĭello Russo's idiosyncrasies don't stop at clothing. Dello Russo's train of thought is simple: "It's my first job to make myself up. Except Dello Russo has affixed a pair of bowling ball-sized fibreglass cherries to her head – she also sported a gold version at the autumn/winter 2011 New York shows, with a rodeo-fringed leather coat to match. A fairly standard fashion editor wardrobe, you might think. Today, she is wearing a leopard-print Lanvin dress, Bulgari jewels and Manolo Blahnik shoes. You can tell that as soon as she walks into a room, looking like a living, breathing editorial page from Vogue Japan, her Condé Nast powerhouse. Anna Dello Russo is not just any fashion editor.
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