Trained as an architect at Milan Polytechnic, Gianfranco Ferré founded his label in 1978 and was soon called the "architect of fashion". He made clothes with the logic of a building: strong structure, precise volumes and luxurious fabrics, sketched with the exactness of a technical drawing. Long stays in India early in his career shaped his love of rich colour, silk and draping. His crisp white shirt, reinvented season after season, became his signature. From 1989 to 1996 he was creative director of Christian Dior, the first Italian to hold the role. Ferré's work is power and elegance in perfect balance, made to last.