After three decades at the helm, Donatella Versace steps down

It took nearly 30 years for the critics to be right about Donatella Versace not lasting at her brother Gianni’s fashion label.

When Donatella stepped up after Gianni’s 1997 murder, critics doubted her ability to harness the brand’s exuberance and sexiness. Nearly 30 years later, Donatella is leaving one of the most influential positions in fashion.

“It has been the greatest honour of my life to carry on my brother Gianni’s legacy,” Versace said in a media release. “He was the true genius, but I hope I have some of his spirit and tenacity.”

Since taking the reins of the business founded by Gianni in 1987, Donatella has demonstrated true spirit and determination, continuing her brother’s legacy while weathering financial challenges. In 2018, the business was sold to Capri Holdings for €2 billion ($3.45 billion).

While Gianni changed red carpet history in 1994 when Elizabeth Hurley attended the premiere of Four Weddings and a Funeral in that safety-pin dress, Donatella’s career-defining moment came with Jennifer Lopez in 2000. The jungle-print dress worn by Lopez to the Grammy Awards in 2000 became so widely searched on the internet that it helped create Google’s Image search.

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“At the time, it was the most popular search query we had ever seen,” former Google chief executive Eric Schmidt wrote on Project Syndicate in 2015.   “But we had no surefire way of getting users exactly what they wanted: J­Lo wearing that dress. Google Image Search was born.”

Angelina Jolie achieved similar levels of viral popularity, attending the 2012 Oscars in a black Versace dress with a thigh-high slit.

It wasn’t just about the dresses. With her straight, peroxide-blonde hair, Donatella became a fashion celebrity rivalling the late Karl Lagerfeld. She appeared in Ben Stiller’s fashion spoof film Zoolander in 2001 and was playfully imitated by Maya Rudolph on Saturday Night Live.