A Look at Giorgio Armani's New Exhibition Celebrating His 20 Years of Haute Couture
MILAN — Giorgio Armani is opening the golden gates of haute couture to the public by way of a dazzling exhibition staged at the Armani/Silos space here.
Inaugurated with an event on Tuesday evening and officially running May 21 to Dec. 28, the showcase is titled 'Giorgio Armani Privé 2005-2025, Twenty Years of Haute Couture' to mark the milestone for the designer's Privé line, which he introduced with a spring 2005 collection paraded in Paris.
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Ever since, Armani presented his haute couture collections in the City of Light twice a year, with the only exception being January 2021, when, due to the pandemic, he staged the fashion show behind closed doors at Palazzo Orsini here and then broadcast as part of the Paris couture schedule.
So this is the first time the Milanese audience and the general public can get an up-close look at his haute couture creations, indulge in the rich embroideries, beaded embellishments and crafty details and discover the references behind the dreamy garments.
Armani himself curated the set-up at the Silos space, which had more than 150 couture looks arranged across four levels, either spotlighted singularly or grouped in thematic rooms, according to colors or inspiration.
'We've heard you've curated the installation yourself until last night,' Armani was told at the opening event. 'Actually, until this morning,' he quickly replied.
'I'm looking at this exhibition again with the critical eye of a person that has designed all these dresses at different times, with different means, different techniques and different skills. So I have a strong critical sense and I won't tell you what doesn't work but what does. And that is to have chosen a path, and most importantly, [ran it] not being led by the hand by anyone,' he said.
'In my haute couture collections, I express my vision of style and elegance through the art of craftsmanship and savoir-faire: only here am I free to do so without limits,' said Armani. 'Twenty years of Giorgio Armani Privé have been an extraordinary, liberating journey. Now, I want to share it with a wider audience, inviting them into this dream of mine, a dream of dresses woven from imagination and grace. A very special world that takes on new meaning in this exhibition.'
Visitors will be able to see garments pulled from the designer's couture shows as well as custom made Privé gowns seen on international red carpets through the years. These ranged from the Swarovski crystal mesh gown worn by Cate Blanchett at the 2007 Academy Awards to the spring 2010 strapless, sculptural number Jennifer Lopez picked for the same occasion in 2010; from the long-sleeve, floral-embroidered spring 2021 dress Nicole Kidman sported at the SAG Awards in 2021 to the custom champagne silk gown Demi Moore wore to scoop up her first Golden Globe award earlier this year.
Accessories such as bags, shoes, jewelry and headpieces were also showcased, both across the exhibition and in a dedicated section in the space's top level, flanked by an area screening backstage footage of the Armani Privé shows.
The exhibit's sensory experience was replete with dim lighting, the Armani Privé high-end fragrance Bois d'Encens lingering in the air and an original soundtrack L'Antidote music trio Redi Hasa, Rami Khalifé and Bijan Chemirani created specifically for the show.
The Italian designer, who this year also marks 50 years in business with his namesake brand, has always seen couture as a forum for experimentation in both design and formats. For one, as early as his second couture collection in 2005, he introduced daytime options to the lineup, highlighting a new approach to couture.
In January 2007, he also decided to broadcast the spring 2007 couture show live online for the first time from the Museum of Modern Art in Paris. At the time, he addressed that couture 'represents the pinnacle of creativity and sartorial skill, but it is only accessible to the few' and how 'today, through the democracy of the Internet, we can offer a front-row seat to everyone.'
Armani paraded his latest couture collection, for spring 2025, in Paris earlier this year, presenting a sophisticated lineup that acknowledged the diverse references the designer has made with his couture designs over time, from the linear elegance of Japan and the shapes and colors of China to the opulence of India, the decorum of North Africa and the landscapes of Polynesia. This was the first collection presented at Palazzo Armani, which was unveiled last year.
A historic building dating back to 1864 and located nearby Avenue Montaigne, Palazzo Armani spans over 21,527 square feet to house the couture atelier and several offices, including the designer's workspace and departments such as sales and communications. Originally built as a private residence, the estate changed use in 1912, becoming the headquarters of various companies until Armani took over and restored the stuccoes and period paintings decorating its rooms.
As for the Silos space, opposite Armani's theater, it was inaugurated in 2015 with a retrospective of the designer's clothes and has staged several exhibitions, spanning from those dedicated to Larry Fink or Sarah Moon to Tadao Ando's work, to name a few.
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Advertisement Pratta began working for Questcor in 2010 as the sales rep in the Northeast region for Acthar, a drug which helped relieve autoimmune and inflammatory disorders. 'If prescribed correctly, Acthar could help people walk again. And talk again,' writes Pratta. But, she adds, 'Questcor made more money when it was prescribed incorrectly.' They would do anything to sell Acthar. Advertisement From paying doctors to prescribe it to using bogus research studies proclaiming its miraculous efficacy, they were so successful that Achtar's price rose from $40 per vial in 2000 to nearly $39,000 in 2019 — an increase of 97,000%. Pratta's determination to do the right thing was partly the result of a traumatic childhood tainted by physical and sexual abuse. 8 Acthar's price rose from $40 per vial in 2000 to nearly $39,000 in 2019 — an increase of 97,000%. Acthar 'I had to fight for myself and develop that inner strength,' she says. 'I needed tenacity.' Advertisement That tenacity was put to the test when Pratta began to uncover the extent of Questcor's corruption. Some sales reps were making up to $4 million a year and, in turn, kept the physicians doing their bidding in a life of luxury. 'The greed had just taken over. They took them on scuba diving trips and bought clothes and shoes for their wives. One guy bought his doctor a brand new Armani suit and expensed it to Questcor,' she recalls. 'And I'm going to TJ Maxx to buy my shoes.' Though she had deliberated about exposing Questcor, Pratta worried about the ramifications. 'That's all I could think about,' she says. 'I was a single parent, mother of a special needs son and had a ton of debt from my divorce. 'The last thing I needed was to be fired and homeless.' The impetus to act came from former colleague, Pete Keller, who, also concerned about Questcor's methods, had decided to tell the authorities. 8 According to attorney Ross Begelman, Pratta served as a 'relator,' feeding information from her company to the Federal government. Javerbaum Wurgaft Now he needed Pratta, who was still working there, to act as a 'relator' and feed information to lawyers, including health care fraud attorneys Marc Orlow and Ross Begelman. Advertisement To make the case, Pratta compiled as much evidence as possible, surreptitiously making notes at sales meetings and patient programs. 'I used to write notes on the palm of my hand under the table,' she explains. 'If I was at a cocktail party and somebody confessed what they were doing was bribery, I would write it on a napkin in the bathroom or even on my pants. 'I ruined a lot of suits.' Given the financial might of the industry she was battling, Pratta became acutely aware of her own safety. Advertisement Before she turned whistleblower, Pratta researched other relators to see what happened to them. 'Just to see if anybody was murdered,' she explains. 'You know, a mysterious accident or a car blowing up.' 8 In 2012, the Department of Justice began an investigation into Questcor. AP Consequently, she become hyper-vigilant. 'I would see cars sitting at the end of my block and I just got paranoid,' she says. 'I was watching even more when I went in stores or the parking lot. I got a dashcam, too.' Advertisement In January 2012, the Department of Justice began a preliminary investigation into Questcor. Soon, federal agents began calling at Pratta's colleagues' homes and she had to feign shock. But, she writes, 'If I was the only one in the company who didn't get an early-morning visit from the Feds, that wasn't exactly helping me keep my cover.' Soon, Pratta's clandestine role became second nature to her. 'It didn't feel like I was still working for the government. It was like being married to my ex — they were never around, and there was no communication,' she writes. After Questcor was acquired by Irish pharma-giant Mallinckrodt in 2014, pressure to deliver even higher sales increased exponentially and with it came even greater disregard for ethics. 8 After Questcor was acquired by Irish pharma-giant Mallinckrodt in 2014, pressure to deliver even higher sales increased exponentially and with it came even greater disregard for ethics. AP Advertisement In 2017, after she was repeatedly bullied by her boss, Pratta went to HR to complain but was fired soon after, although they maintained it was a corporate restructure, just to avoid a wrongful termination case. 'Ironically, I wasn't fired because I was a double agent feeding information to the Department of Justice. Instead, they got rid of me for the offense of daring to speak out about an abusive manager,' she writes. In March 2019, the Department of Justice served a 100-page lawsuit against Mallinckrodt, alleging illegal marketing of Acthar, bribing doctors to boost sales and defrauding government health care programs It also mentioned Pratta's role in the case, meaning her long-held anonymity was now public knowledge. 'I didn't mind that my former bosses knew; I just wished I could have seen their faces when they put it all together. I hoped they felt that their lives were suddenly out of their control. 'The way the Acthar patients felt.' In the wake of the lawsuit, Mallinckrodt filed for bankruptcy, a move which immediately halted all legal action against them, much to Pratta's frustration. Worse still, a member of the New Jersey plumbers' union with MS had his union file a class action lawsuit against Mallinckrodt — and, as Pratta's identity was now revealed, and she was a New Jersey resident, he named her in it. While four of the five defendants were companies, Pratta was the only individual named.= 'The plumbers' union was not messing around,' she writes. 'They were pissed, and rightly so. In 2018, they'd paid $26,100.28 for one dose of Acthar for one of its members.' While that lawsuit against Pratta was ultimately thrown out, 'by the time it was finally dismissed, I was left with almost $42,000 in attorneys' fees,' she says. Nor did Pratta receive anywhere near the amount of compensation she could have been entitled to as a whistleblower. When Mallinckrodt settled out of court in March 2022, agreeing to pay just $26.3 million for violating the False Claims Act — far less than the amount had the case reached trial — it meant Pratta's percentage share was even smaller. Worse still, it would now be paid in installments, once a year for the next eight years. 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Put a bisht on it. That's a wrap. At first glance it might be tempting to see the 2025 Champions League final as one of the more obviously high-European occasions in recent football history. Twenty thousand Parisians and Milanese will trace out a thousand mile right-angle this weekend, north from Lombardy, east across Alsace and the Rhineland, there to spend a long weekend wandering the white stone streets of Munich, with its reassuringly terrifying gothic cathedral, its pounded-meat cuisine de terroir, its altstadt boutiques selling wristwatches priced at roughly the same the cost as the average human arm, and finally on to the lighted dome of the Allianz Arena, dumped down in the green fringes to the north like a giant alien doughnut. For the first time in five years there isn't a single English person involved as Paris Saint-Germain and Inter meet in the capital of Bavaria. Premier League, Club World Cup. Look upon our Euro splendour and tremble. 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It helps also that the real genius of Qatar has been building power rather than simply working in its shadow. This month the club president, Nasser al-Khelaifi, was seen meeting Jeff Bezos at the Cannes film festival to work out a possible collaboration, the kind of thing that seems logical now for a man who is also president of BeIn Sports, a minister in the Qatari government, head of the European Club Association (ECA), a Uefa executive committee member and even an unexpected face at the recent Gaza peace talks at the Élysée Palace (not the kind of thing Ken Bates, for example, was ever likely to get an invite to). Related: Now or never? Inter ready to seize moment in Champions League final | Nicky Bandini Some people are said to have a finger or two in the pie. Khelaifi has both fists jammed in there so deep it's hard to know where the pie starts and finishes. He is the pie. 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We don't actually need to sit with you now. We are the entire buffet these days. Win or lose on Saturday, that table is set.
