Donatella Versace to be new Givency icon

(by Gioia Giudici).
    (ANSA) - Milan, April 30 - Donatella Versace, who will be turning 60 on May 2, has announced on social media that she will star in a Givenchy campaign for the next winter season. "For my talented friend Riccardo. Together we break fashion boundaries today!" Versace tweeted, posting a photo of herself alongside her friend and fellow fashion designer Riccardo Tisci.
    "So proud and honored to introduce my new ultimate icon," the Givenchy designer wrote as he posted the first campaign image on Instagram.
    This is perhaps the first time in the fashion world of fashion that one designer stars in another brand's advertising campaign. Donatella Versace is known for breaking new ground. Along with her brother Gianni, she transformed models into top models in the 1990s, turning the likes of Naomi Campbell and Cindy Crawford into household names. She was also among the first to grasp the potential of stars as a promotional vehicle for the brand, tying Versace's name to such icons as Princess Diana and Madonna.
    She is also credited for turning little-known actress Elizabeth Hurley into a world star in 1994, thanks to a dress with which she appeared at the preview of the movie Four Weddings and a Funeral alongside her then-fiancé, Hugh Grant.
    At the time, Donatella - who has two children, Allegra and Daniel, from former husband Paul Beck - was the 'deputy' of her brother Gianni, who had given her the role of creative director of the Versus brand. The relationship between the siblings from Reggio Calabria was a symbiotic one enriched by the presence of their brother Santo and violently severed by Gianni's murder in Miami in 1997.
    While in mourning, she stepped into the shoes of the designer who had made the Versace brand into a symbol of ready-to-wear fashion. The period was a difficult one for both the designer and the fashion company's accounts until 2004, when she signed herself into a United States drug detox clinic.
    Ten years after her brother's death, Versace admitted trying to follow in Gianni's footsteps had been tough. "Later I understood that Gianni would have changed," she said. "I understood that I had to find my own style. I now feel truly Donatella...I have had enough of the past," she said.