Gucci (Kering)

Guccio Gucci was born in Florence in 1881 and worked as a lift operator and porter at the Savoy Hotel in London as a young man. He observed wealthy guests arriving with exquisite leather luggage and decided to make something similar. He returned to Florence and opened a leather goods shop in 1921, drawing on the Florentine tradition of fine leather craftsmanship. The GG monogram, the horsebit loafer, and the green-red-green stripe were all introduced in the 1950s and remain central to the brand today.

Grace Kelly was photographed using a Gucci bag to hide her pregnancy from photographers in 1956 — the bag was renamed the "Flora" in her honour. Audrey Hepburn, Jackie Kennedy, and Peter Sellers were all photographed with Gucci products. The brand became synonymous with Italian glamour and Hollywood sophistication. Gucci opened stores in New York, Beverly Hills, and Tokyo in the 1960s, becoming one of the first European luxury brands to establish a global retail presence.

Guccio Gucci's sons and grandsons spent decades fighting each other for control of the company in disputes that combined Italian family drama with corporate dysfunction at operatic scale. Different family members controlled different product lines, different territories, and different manufacturing operations — often refusing to cooperate with each other. By the 1980s, Gucci products had been so widely licensed — to luggage, watches, cigarette lighters, toilet paper — that the brand had lost all prestige. A Gucci logo appeared on approximately 22,000 products.

Tom Ford joined Gucci as creative director in 1990 and, working with CEO Domenico De Sole, transformed the brand. Ford eliminated the licensing agreements, reduced the product range to a focused luxury offering, and redesigned Gucci's aesthetic from the ground up. His 1995 collection — featuring satin hipsters, velvet suits, and a sexuality that was provocative without being vulgar — was credited with saving the brand. Gucci's revenues quadrupled in three years. Ford later said: "I gave Gucci a point of view."

On March 27, 1995, Maurizio Gucci — the last family member to control the company, who had sold his stake to Investcorp in 1993 — was shot dead on the steps of his Milan office. His ex-wife Patrizia Reggiani had hired a hitman. She was convicted in 1998 and sentenced to 29 years in prison. When asked why she hadn't killed him herself, she reportedly said: "I didn't want to get my hands dirty." She was released in 2016 after serving 18 years. The case was dramatised in Ridley Scott's 2021 film "House of Gucci," starring Lady Gaga.