Photo BY Eliana Godino
Anton Giulio Grande is the last of the romantics, and above all a true, incurable aesthete. It’s hard to find someone like him in fashion, a Mediterranean dandy with a love of classicism but also open to transgression, “a solid head and a tender heart,” as Bertrand Russell would have described him had he known him. Highly cultured, curious, and a citizen of the world, Anton Giulio is grateful to his native Rome, which adopted him in the 1990s and gifted him with the magic of runways in the most exclusive and scenic locations. Like the spectacular Spanish Steps, which hosted the couturier’s sexy and refined creations four times in the late 1990s as part of the unforgettable fashion show “Donna sotto le stelle,” broadcast worldwide. Trained in the humanities and with an unwavering passion for art in all its forms, from Raphael to Francis Bacon, Anton Giulio learned the techniques of couture at Polimoda in Florence and the prestigious FIT in New York, a school also attended by one of his idols, Tom Ford. His haute couture exudes thrills and genuine emotion, but above all, it conveys a sense of what a designer’s social role should be: to make people more beautiful. An image maker but also an interpreter of his time, Anton Giulio Grande, pampered throughout his 20-year career by divas, jet-set enchantresses, and style icons, from Rita Levi Montalcini to Sophia Loren, from Asia Argento to Claudia Cardinale, has been called “Gianni Versace’s heir apparent,” with the blessing of Santo, brother of the Italian fashion legend and strategist of his billion-dollar empire. It’s no coincidence that Anton Giulio, great in name and in deed, also hails from Magna Graecia and the charming, wild Calabria. Devoted to the lessons of the great masters of haute couture such as Valentino Garavani, Gianni Versace, Gianfranco Ferré, Emanuel Ungaro, but also Yves Saint Laurent, Karl Lagerfeld, and Cristobal Balenciaga, the designer from Lamezia Terme is truly immersed in contemporary life. It’s no coincidence that his Instagram profile boasts over 115,000 followers worldwide. But from the heights of his culture and passion for beauty, Grande never loses his composure, without losing a hint of the politesse of a Latin gentleman. He approaches his life with grace, without smudges, and without ever exaggerating, faithful to his mission of enhancing the female and male body and cultivating and extolling beauty as an aesthetic value and a vocation to reconcile the ancient dualism between the Apollonian and the Dionysian, between the spirit of geometry and the spirit of finesse. We met him for an intimate conversation with one of the protagonists of Italian haute couture, a style that unfortunately risks disappearing today, forgetting its bygone grandeur. For Anton Giulio Grande, fashion is aspirational and daydreaming, an element that emerges explicitly from our conversation.
Anton Giulio, what are your icons, your distinguishing features?
I grew up surrounded by Southern women; my maternal grandmother was a highly creative seamstress who created sophisticated macramé blankets. From her, I inherited my passion for lace dresses, for finely embroidered shawls that envelop the body in a sinuous embrace, for subtle transparencies, for delicate pleats, for black, and for sensual bodices. For me, sensuality is the expressive language of freedom, a freedom that belongs to all women and makes them more attractive and seductive. And seduction is a complex liturgy tied to the soul and the mind rather than to mere corporeality. Many of my clients, in addition to their sensual bodies, possess talent and professionalism. They are women who hold various prominent social roles, and they all want to feel comfortable in their own skin without sacrificing their innate femininity.
What do you think is the future of Made in Italy?
I’m not saying we should forget the global dimension of our interests, but we should certainly rediscover the genius loci, and we Italians can boast so much beauty and excellence. Lace, for example, was not born in France, as is mistakenly believed, but rather comes from Venice. There are magnificent Italian laces that are just as worthy of French, Belgian, and Flemish lace. Our Italianness must be the foundation from which to begin again, our strength. And to face future challenges, we cannot deny our roots because, as Giambattista Vico said, history is cyclical and not so linear.
You have dedicated your career to the exaltation of feminine beauty, in the spirit of a decorative eroticism that has enchanted many of your most famous clients and friends. Who are your muses?
I have several, and I favor the ‘belles dame sans merci’, the femmes fatales: Greta Garbo, Rita Hayworth, Gloria Swanson, and Lana Turner. For your
Photo by Eliana Godino
Location : Biblioteca Casanatense Roma