Riccardo Bellini leaves Margiela for Chloé

By

Dominique Muret

Translated by
Nicola Mira

Published
Oct 31, 2019

After 12 years, Riccardo Bellini is leaving Italian fashion group OTB, and in particular its label Maison Margiela, which he has led since 2017, to join Swiss luxury group Richemont. From December 1, Bellini will take charge of Chloé, one of the fashion labels in Richemont’s brand portfolio. He succeeds Geoffroy de la Bourdonnaye, who has been in charge of the Parisian label since 2010.
 

The new appointment was announced by both labels, with separate press releases. Chloé said that Geoffroy de la Bourdonnaye has decided to leave the house at the end of November, and thanked him for “his tenure as CEO, for the contribution he gave to the label and his extensive involvement in the transformation of Chloé.”

Before joining Chloé, de la Bourdonnaye was for three years the brains behind the relaunch of London department store Liberty. He began his business career in the beverage industry with Pepsico, then joined Walt Disney, where he held several senior manager posts during the course of a decade, then moved to the fashion industry in 2003, when he was appointed president of Christian Lacroix.

As for Maison Margiela, it thanked “Riccardo for his work and his contribution to the group,” and indicated that a new CEO “will be announced in due course.”
 
Bellini has an Economics degree from Milan’s Bocconi University, and started his career at Procter & Gamble, where he worked for 12 years, the last two as marketing director of the Beauty & Prestige division. In 2007, he joined Renzo Rosso’s OTB group, where he spent 10 years at denim label Diesel, in various managerial and marketing roles. In 2015, he was appointed executive vice-president and marketing director of Diesel and Diesel Black Gold, and took charge of Maison Margiela two years later.
 
His appointment is expected to give new impetus to Chloé, whose creative director since April 2017 is Natacha Ramsay-Levi. In parallel, Richemont announced last week the creation of a joint-venture company with designer Alber Elbaz. Maison Margiela instead recently announced the extension of its Creative Director John Galliano’s contract.