Dear Elio

The fashion and stores created by Elio Fiorucci in the late 1960s were a great creative hotbed for the following decades, anticipating many of the trends that emerged later and the ideas of the next generation of designers. Elio Fiorucci's innate curiosity led him to explore the unknown, to broaden his vision towards new currents of freedom of expression, beyond the borders of his country, in search of other energies. This book recalls his new, joyful, mocking, free realm, and the conception of unconventional clothing that upset the rules of the bourgeois, conformist world of the 1960s. It is a choral fresco, told through the letters of those who worked with him, including absolute beginners, professionals who knew him and shared his passions, family, and friends: architects such as Antonio Citterio and Michele De Lucchi, photographers, artists (Andy Warhol and Keith Haring, who decorated the entire Milan store in 1983), singers, and actors who attended his stores and parties. Direct testimonials come from the likes of Biba (Barbara Hulanicki), Oliviero Toscani, Donna Jordan, Terry Jones, Italo Lupi, Alessandro Mendini, Paul Caranicas and Joey Arias. The book also features a preface by Janie and Stephen Schaeffer, the current brand owners.