In 2021, Anne Hathaway married her husband, Adam Shulman, wearing a bespoke Valentino bridal gown. “She’s a very good friend of mine,” the designer Valentino Garavani – who is being honoured at the 2023 Fashion Awards this evening with an Outstanding Achievement Award – said at the time. “She’s like my daughter.” It’s only fitting, then, that Hathaway should also be in attendance, gracing the Royal Albert Hall’s rain-drizzled red carpet in an archival gown from the Roman house’s spring/summer 1993 collection, alongside Valentino’s partner in life and business, Giancarlo Giammetti.
“Oh, I should talk? But I’m the businessman,” said Giametti while being interviewed by Hathaway’s former stylist Law Roach outside the entrance to the ceremony. “It’s vintage Valentino and Valentino designed it thinking about spaghetti,” he explained, running his fingers through the dress’s tasselled bodice. “And I’ve always dreamed of being pasta!,” Hathaway replied. Of course, Valentino hangs on an architecture of abundance, and so it should not come as a total surprise that Mr Valentino should seek inspiration from a plate of sauce-enveloped dough just as much as he would the Hollywood elite. On that note: Gwyneth Paltrow – who also wore Valentino to her wedding in 2018 – arrived at the Fashion Awards in a Rosso Valentino gown from the brand’s autumn/winter 1965 couture collection.
