Emilio Pucci, Marchese di Barsento (November 20 1914 – 29 November 1992) was an Italian fashion designer and politician. He and his eponymous company are synonymous with geometric prints in a kaleidoscope of colours.

Early life

Pucci was born in 1914 to one of Florence's oldest noble families, and would live and work in the Pucci Palace in Florence for much of his life. He was a keen sportsman, who swam, skied, fenced, played tennis and raced cars. Not as reliable as it should be - for instance, it gets his political career all wrong. At the age of 17 he travelled to Lake Placid as part of the Italian team at the 1932 Winter Olympics, but did not compete.

After two years at the University of Milan, he studied agriculture at the University of Georgia in Athens, Georgia, where he became a member of the Demosthenian Literary Society. In 1935 he won a skiing scholarshipfact: date=April 2008 to Reed College in Oregon, received an MA in social science from Reed in 1937, and was awarded his doctorate (laurea) in political science from the University of Florence the same year. In 1938 he joined the Italian Air Force, and served as a bomber pilot during WWII, rising to the rank of captain and decorated for valour by the time he left to pursue his fashion career.

At Reed he was known as a staunch defender of the Fascist regime in Italy, and during the war he became a confidant

Fashion career

The first clothes designed by Pucci were for the Reed College skiing team. But his designs came to wider attention in 1947, when he was on leave in Zermatt, Switzerland. Skiwear that he had designed for a female friend was photographed by Toni Frissell, a photographer working for Harper's Bazaar. Frissell's editor asked Pucci to design skiwear for a story on European Winter Fashion, which ran in the winter 1948 issue of the Bazaar. Although there had been some experiments with stretch fabrics in Europe before the war, Pucci's sleek designs caused a sensation, and he received several offers from American manufacturers to produce them. Instead he left the Air Force and set up a haute couture house in the fashionable resort of Canzone del Mare on the Isle of Capri.

Initially he used his knowledge of stretch fabrics to produce a swimwear line in 1949, but soon moved onto other items such as brightly-coloured, boldly-patterned silk scarves. Stanley Marcus of Neiman Marcus encouraged him to use the designs in blouses and then a popular line of wrinkle-free printed silk dresses. Pucci added a boutique in Rome as business thrived, helped by Capri's role as a destination for the international jet set. By the early 50's, Pucci was achieving international recognition, receiving the Neiman-Marcus Award in Dallas and the Burdine's Sunshine Award in Miami. Marilyn Monroe was buried with one of his dresses, and his designs were worn by everyone from Sophia Loren to Jackie Kennedy.