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 Puglisi got his big break in 2010 when Dolce & Gabbana
invited him to sell his clothes in their shop in Milan, and he
opened his first mono-brand store in Rome last year.
Now he wants to distribute his bejeweled bodices, printed
blouses and flared skirts all over the world.
"I want to be huge. I want to be on Mars," the tattooed 37
year-old told Reuters as he waited for delivery of his
autumn-winter collection ahead of his second catwalk show in
Milan after a 2013 debut at the city's biannual women's fashion
week.
Born in Sicily, Puglisi went to New York aged 18 and worked as a
waiter before he met stylists Patti Wilson and Arianne Phillips,
who introduced their clients Whitney Houston and Madonna to a
capsule collection he had made in Italy.
When Madonna chose to wear Puglisi, fellow Sicilian designer
Domenico Dolce and his partner Stefano Gabbana took notice.
"Puglisi is a typical Sicilian name...it's like Smith in
London," Puglisi chuckled. "Domenico Dolce kept asking: who is
this Puglisi?"
Being chosen by the Milan-based duo to appear at a star-studded
showcase for new designers eventually provided Puglisi with the
two essentials for any fledgling fashion business: publicity and
investment.
"The great thing about this project is that they really
supported all the designers by buying the collection," Puglisi
said. "It's not just visibility, it's money as well...to make
beauty you need money."
Proud of his Italian roots, Puglisi says Italian fashion buyers
supported him from the beginning. But he bemoans the lack of
organized promotion for an industry which Italy's national
chamber of fashion estimates will earn 65 billion euros ($89.07
billion) in 2014.
"It's insane that in Italy we still don't have a museum of
fashion. We had to wait for the V&A (London's Victoria & Albert
Museum) to do the glamour of Italian fashion and here what we
do? Nothing."
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 INDEPENDENT
The search for funds has led many fashion brands to sell stakes
to private equity firms or industrial groups.
Among the other names on show at "The Glamour of
Italian Fashion" at the V&A from April 5, Gianfranco Ferre and
Valentino have been bought by Dubai and Qatari investors
respectively, while Gucci and Fendi are owned by French luxury
groups Kering and LVMH respectively.
The brand founded by Gianni Versace, whom Puglisi
describes as his "maestro", is selling a minority stake.
But Puglisi has no current plans to accept outside investment that
would oblige him to give up some control of the business, which he
estimates will make a profit of 10 million euros ($13.7 million) in
2014.
"There are many people that would like to invest and at the moment I
am just listening. I want to be independent."
This independence extends beyond creative control.
"I supervise everything. It's very important to have
a creative vision, but also an entrepreneurial vision," Puglisi
said. "I'm the first one to say: What's going on with the clothes?
What's the bestseller? What do women want?"
As well as his namesake brand, Puglisi is creative director for
French label Emanuel Ungaro, which floundered after its founding
designer retired in 2004 and horrified fashionistas by hiring
Lindsay Lohan as an artistic adviser in 2010.
"Fausto is (my) son, but Ungaro is a challenge," said Puglisi, who
presented his first collection in March last year for Ungaro, after
it signed a license agreement with Italy's Aeffe Group as part of a
bid to revive the label.
"In only one year Ungaro is at Harrod's, Selfridges, Barneys,
Saks....the best shops in the world. I started with Aeffe Group to
rebuild this brand and for me it's still nothing because I want to
create a monster and I will do that."
($1 = 0.7298 euros)
(Editing by Michael Roddy and Mark Heinrich)
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