Fashion world mourns Anna Piaggi

Piaggi, an unmissable figure on every front row thanks to her theatrical personal style and vivid blue hair, inspired generations of creatives with her work and approach to fashion.

Born in Milan in 1931, she embarked on her media career in the 1960s and quickly became editor of women’s magazine Arianna. Her long collaboration with Italian Vogue began in the ’70.

Piaggi developed close, collaborative friendships with Stephen Jones, Manolo Blahnik and Karl Lagerfeld. The Chanel designer featured Piaggi in more than 200 drawings and dedicated the book A Fashion Journal to his muse.

Piaggi and her considerable fashion collection were the subjects of Anna Piaggi: Fashion-ology, a 2006 exhibition curated by Judith Clark at the Victoria & Albert Museum.

'I was a devotee of Vanity magazine before I knew why, her Doppie Pagine informed how I place one garment next to another, her stories around her archive [are] the most vivid accounts of history I know,' Clark told us as news of Piaggi's passing emerged.

'I spoke to her last Thursday about the forthcoming Chloe.attitudes exhibition and she said she had a new excuse to have new ideas. It feels now like we have been interrupted halfway through a sentence.'

A tireless innovator, Piaggi worked into her old age, turning heads and drawing associations that continued to enliven the fashion field.

It was Lagerfeld who described Piaggi most famously: ‘She’s not pretty,’ he said; ‘shes’s worse.’