«Back then, for those who didn’t live through it, it’s impossible to understand what fashion really was. The top photographers shot major campaigns in Milan, the big magazines came to shoot in Milan, and the greatest designers in the world were Italian. Milan was the fashion capital. New York and Paris were years, generations behind»
«There are people who don’t really know my story, especially my social background, except for those truly rooted in Milan’s important fashion world, because many of them are still alive and many have been interviewed for something major I'm working on,» says Corona. «They don’t truly know what social background I come from. Because I come from a bourgeois family, but most importantly, I come from a father who was considered the greatest genius of creative journalism in Italy,» he tells us, referring to Vittorio Corona, a heavyweight of Milanese publishing and the mind behind a vast number of publications that filled Italian newsstands for years. «My father started working as a journalist very young at La Sicilia, in Catania. Then he moved to Milan and began working on magazines that, oddly enough, actually succeeded.» His first major role was as editor-in-chief at Novella 2000, which «in the ’70s wasn’t a gossip magazine but a very important magazine covering current events. Back then, society news was very relevant, and these magazines were the best-selling ones of the time, when there was no television, no mass media, no social networks. Publications like Oggi and Novella 2000 were the most important in Italy - not just the most read.» He had essentially landed a permanent position when he met Paolo Occhipinti, editorial director at Rizzoli (now RCS Periodici), and was «immediately hired,» Corona continues. «Back in those days, if you didn’t live through them, it’s hard to understand what fashion really meant,» he goes on. «Fashion was represented by Milan, which was the Caput Mundi. The great photographers shot major campaigns in Milan, the big magazines came to Milan, the top designers in the world were Italian. Milan was the fashion capital. New York and Paris were years, generations behind. During Fashion Week, the entire world would come. And Milan was the most important city in the world. Above all, Italy set the rules in fashion. That’s how my father started working at Annabella,» he tells us. Which, he adds, «underwent a major transformation during the industry crisis, eventually becoming just Anna.»