The Modern Muses of Dolce & Gabbana

Dolce & Gabbana’s Spring/Summer 2025 show was a celebration of Italian beauty – and a tribute to their longtime muse, Madonna. We take a look at how influential and inspirational the iconic star has been for the design duo – and some of the other incredible women who have played muse to the house.

MADONNA

The first Dolce & Gabbana look that Madonna wore was a corset encrusted with multi-coloured gemstones, paired with a black tailored jacket, gem-embellished gloves and thigh-high stockings. Donned for the premiere of her documentary, Truth Or Dare: In Bed With Madonna, in 1991, it was the start of a mutual admiration and creative partnership that has spanned nearly 25 years. Two years later the legendary singer went on the road with The Girlie Show (a concert tour that supported her Erotica album and coincided with the release of her headline-generating book, Sex), and she enlisted Dolce & Gabbana to help craft hundreds of stage looks including a Marlene Dietrich-inspired top hat and tails. The duo dressed her, too, for the cover of her Hard Candy album and her 2001 Drowned World tour, not to mention countless red carpets.

The star has been a regular on the Dolce & Gabbana front row ever since her first appearance in 1992, and she’s been the face of as well as a muse to the brand. The most iconic moment? In 2010 she was photographed by Steven Meisel for the brand’s evocative black and white ad campaign, a celebration of the day-to-day lives of Italian families

MONICA BELLUCCI

Italian beauties don’t get much more iconic than Monica Bellucci. The actress, model and Bond girl has long played muse to Dolce & Gabbana – she’s been walking their runways since the early 90s. In 1995 she starred in a commercial for the brand’s fragrance, Sicily (you can find it on YouTube) that perfect encapsulates its Dolce Vita vibe – and it ran on Italian television for years. Now aged 60 and still looking incredible, her appeal shows no sign of waning. So much so, in fact, that in 2024 Rizzoli published a glossy coffee table book entitle Monica by Dolce & Gabbana, a compilation of some of the most captivating photos taken of the actress and muse over the years by iconic photographers.

The design duo has found their Bellucci inspiration to be multi-generational, too; Deva Cassel, Bellucci’s daughter with French actor Vincent Cassel, was cast as the face of Dolce & Gabbana’s Dolce Shine perfume campaign in 2020.

ISABELLA ROSSELLINI

Rossellini is another woman who embodies the seductive glamour that is the Dolce & Gabbana signature. The model, actress and philanthropist has inspired the designers since the early days of their label and the striking AW94 ad campaign, starring Rossellini dressed in, amongst other things, a pinstriped jacket, white shirt and tie, still finds its way onto countless moodboards.

She’s walked for the fashion house on a multitude of occasions, and not always solo: during the brand’s SS19 show, a celebration of the beauty of all ages, Rossellini took to the catwalk in an embroidered lace robe, accompanied not only by her daughter, Elettra Wiedemann, but her then eight-month old grandson, Ronin, too.

NAOMI CAMPBELL

The supermodel has worked with, walked for and been friends with Domenico Dolce and Stefano Gabbana for decades. She’s taken to the runway and fronted campaigns for the brand countless times, but her most famous outing wearing one of its pieces was much more unexpected. In 2007 Campbell was carrying out five days of community service at the New York Sanitation Department. When she finished work on the last day she swapped her high-vis jacket for a demi-couture D&G gown – silver, sequinned, full length and fabulous – and strode out past the waiting pack of press and photographers. The move has become the stuff of fashion legend and the dress can currently be seen in the Victoria & Albert Museum’s Naomi exhibition.

THE KARDASHIANS

Kim Kardashian’s bombshell aesthetic is a natural fit for the overt femininity of Dolce & Gabbana. For SS23 the brand enlisted the reality star to design a collection with them, charging her to treasure hunt through the Dolce archives for inspiration. The result, named ‘Ciao Kim’, was a line-up that riffed on the image of a ‘sensual Italian mob wife’, and a blonde Kardashian was inevitably cast as the face of its campaign, too. Then, in November last year, the trio unveiled a collaboration between the Italian fashion house and Skims, Kardashians shapewear line. Appearing alongside Kim in the Nadia Lee Cohen-shot campaign was her sister Kourtney who also has an ongoing relationship with the designers. In 2022 Dolce & Gabbanna dressed Kourtney for her opulent Portofino wedding to singer Travis Barker, conjuring a white corseted mini-dress and trailing embroidered lace veil inspired in part by Guns ‘N Roses’ November Rain music video.

MADONNA, REINVENTED

In September the duo used their SS25 collection to pay tribute to the archetypal Italian beauty, sending 58 down the runway who all bore more than a passing resemblance to 90s, Blond Ambition-era Madonna thanks to their cropped, peroxide blonde wigs and black headbands. The icon herself was the show’s guest of honour, making her way to the front row in suitably dramatic fashion dressed in a full-length black lace veil.

Held at the Metropol, the restored Milanese cinema owned by the brand, the catwalk centred around a dramatic mirrored staircase which each model descended in full Dolce Vita glamour, all elegantly figure-hugging silhouettes, ladylike handbags and statement gold jewellery. The collection showcased 1950s-inspired conical bras and sheer lingerie, artfully layered with luxe oversized trench coats, bombshell slit dresses and bold floral prints taken from the fashion house’s archives. The effect was electrifying with all the high-octane sensuality and powerful diva attitude that makes Dolce & Gabbana so unique.