Brioni, the greatest expression of Roman sartorial luxury, celebrated its 80th anniversary Friday with a display of beautiful tailoring and a gala dinner.

Movie stars like Regé-Jean Page, Sean Teale or Ed Speleers; Korean sensation Lee Soo Hyuk; local Italian thespians such as Luca Argentaro or Stefano Accorsi showed up alongside a gang of VICs and the most important buyer in American menswear, Bruce Pask of Bergdorf Goodman.
 
All of them cutting a sartorial swathe through the Chiostro del Bramante, a superb cloister designed by Donato Bramante, the master architect who brought the High Renaissance style to Rome.

Like the beautifully proportioned building, Brioni’s clothes are all about harmoniously elegant and understated panache.
 

An artful presentation in the cloister celebrated the history of Brioni, the first menswear brand to stage a runway show, back in 1952 in the legendary Sala Bianca of Florence.
 
Founded as a Casa di Alta Moda Maschile in 1945, as Italy emerged from the ruins of WW2, Brioni became an emblem of Italian gentlemanly elegance. When founders Gaetano Savini and Nazareno Fonticoli began taking their early collections on tour in the U.S., they effectively invented the trunk show. Though polished, Brioni was always path-breaking, once flooding the Waldorf Astoria ballroom for a dramatic 1964 show. 
 
Stockman held superb tuxedos worn by the likes of Oscar Isaac or Marcello Mastroianni, who wore Brioni in Fellini’s “La Dolce Vita“. As did Pierce Brosnan and Daniel Craig in several James Bond movies.
 

Since 2011, Brioni has been part of the Paris-based Kering luxury empire. And designed since 2018 by the brilliant Austrian men’s couturier Norbert Stumpfl, famed for his blend of perfect tailoring and path-breaking fabrics – like 24-karat gold thread tuxedos, or enzyme-altered silk-linens with unique fuzzy hands. During his tenure, Brioni has also skillfully branched into women’s wear, expressing quiet luxury with rare aplomb.
 
Hosting the dinner with Federico Arrigoni, appointed CEO in May, as guests dined on crispy artichoke and cacio e pepe risotto.
 
“Since Brioni was born in Rome 80 years ago, it has shaped the meaning of men’s elegance for generations. 
By tonight, it’s not just about the past. It’s about the future. This that we are living tonight is a turning point for us. It’s a moment to reaffirm who we are, but a moment to commit to the next chapter of this extraordinary story. Innovating while staying true to our essence and continuing to define the codes of Italian contemporary elegance,” said Arrigoni in a short speech.

Dinner was followed a jazz performance by the famed singer Mario Biondi, who remarked: “In Rome, one often sees very beautiful and elegant women. But it is rare, like tonight, to see such handsome and elegant men!”
 
After which, guests enjoyed nightcaps and negronis inside the cloister’s sacristy, where beauty and elegance reined.
 
“The thing is, girls are loving Brioni as much as men now,” explained Isabella Ferrari, the willowy blonde Italian actress, dressed in an impeccably cut black pants suit. 
 
Ferrari famously encounters Jep Gambardella, the protagonist of Paolo Sorrentino’s “La Grande Bellezza”, that masterpiece of Italian cinema that is an ode to art, decadence and the world’s most sophisticated parties.  
 

Asked what she was doing by Jep, Ferrari’s character replies, “I am rich.” 
 
Which is exactly how everyone dressed in Brioni looked on Friday night.