Russia’s most famous fashion designer Vyacheslav ‘Slava’ Zaitsev has passed away. Russian news outlets reported this on Sunday. The 85-year-old Zaitsev could count, among others, the First Ladies of Russia among his clientele.
According to the TASS news agency, he died after a long illness, but the day of his death was not disclosed. According to Russian media, he was taken to a hospital in the Moscow region with stomach bleeding and died in intensive care.
Zaitsev was born on March 2, 1938 in Ivanovo – the center of the textile industry, about 300 kilometers northeast of Moscow. It was a time when almost everyone in the former Soviet Union was dressed in old-fashioned, dull and gray clothing.
The designer made his breakthrough at home and abroad when Raisa, the wife of Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, started wearing his creations in the eighties and nineties. Thanks to the visibility of the Soviet couple and the reform program known as “perestroika”, Zaitsev soon began exhibiting his designs in Paris, Tokyo and other world cities.
Lyudmila, the wife of Russian President Vladimir Putin, was also dressed by Zaitsev. She wore one of his dresses during a state visit to the United Kingdom in June 2003, which was also attended by Queen Elizabeth II.
Zaitsev founded his own fashion house in Russia and won numerous awards at home and abroad.
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