Vogue Italia's June 2025 Fendi Focus Is Timely As Titans Team LVMH 'Ups the Ante' AOC Fashion

For those of us still swooning after Tuesday’s Christian Dior Cruise Show in Rome, we might love Vogue Italia’s June 2025 fashion story ‘Cento Per Cento’ [100 percent] . . . or not. For certain at AOC, models Stella Hanan and Clara Denison represent resolute, independent-minded women in the mold of Dior’s fantabulous, for-the-ages artistic director Maria Grazia Chiuri.

Vogue Italia’s fashion story is styled by Luca Galasso, with images by Théo de Gueltz [IG]. / Makeup by Anthony Preel; hair by Eugene Souleiman

All Roads Lead to Rome, But About Avignon . . .

Especially because I’ve been so deep in writing about the Crusades, the birth of humanism and now Pope Leo as a foil to MAGA Republicans, my jaw-dropped as low as it ever has, when Nicolas Ghesquière of Louis Vuitton Women roared into Avignon last week.

I’ve been waiting to speak after watching Louis Vuitton Cruise, for Tuesday to see Christian Dior in Rome.

Titan Brands and High Stakes Poker

I see these two titan brands — Louis Vuitton and Christian Dior — as bookends in this critical moment. Most everything else in luxury world pales next to them.

Yes, the business headwinds are strong and no thanks to America for the mess we’ve created. But with the Ralph Lauren Polo design vibe installed and taking shape at Celine and the possibility that Fendi — with its strong-willed women — might expand that stable with a new addition, Roman fashion might not know what hit them.

That makes four LVMH powerhouses because I’ve already made peace with a post-Chiuri, Dior world and would hug the next guy. LVMH knows that if you give people enough time to get used to a new idea, a foreboding sky could go simply brilliant.

Wait. If I remember correctly, the industry believes Loro Piano edged out #3 Celine in new financial articles. So five existing powerhouses with the possibility that Fendi will meet the divine, luxury-brand goddess, LVMH financial rainmaker for real.

It’s not the case that no one else can do Fendi. It’s that those clients absolutely devoted to Chiuri will still have a home at LVMH. She will be in Rome, where she has said she wants to be. Imagine the magic she can weave with her connections in the arts.

If I were LVMH this would be my plan — although all parties must agree. The most brilliant creatives are known to say “ENUF: I am the one who is bored with this luxury business party.”

As I said — all roads lead to Italy, in my playbook — but Louis Vuitton basically said last week:

“For crying out loud, Anne. You love that Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris has Adam, Eve and Lilith installed in a relief. Do you seriously think that the French were not deeply involved in the launch of the Renaissance? We had to move the Papacy to Avignon, because Rome looked like a MAGA rally on January 6, 2021. Why don’t you write up that story, Anne!”

Trust me, guys. It’s all in the hopper. ~ Anne