Armani attacks ‘slovenly’ Italians

Giorgio Armani, the septuagenarian Italian fashion designer, has launched a scathing attack on his fellow countrymen, claiming that the new do as you please culture has created a nation of uncouth slobs. "It is time to straighten ourselves out, we are too slovenly," he said yesterday in Milan, as he launched a new collection (pictured) of his trademark suits and blazers at the city's fashion week. "Everything seems to be allowed, even eating and drinking in a church square while stripped to the waist."

Armani, 73, added that Italy's once elegant cities had suffered as a result. "The centre of Milan has become a souk, as has the centre of Florence. The degradation is insane. Once upon a time, you would head straight for the Corso Vittorio Emanuele [Milan's Bond Street], but now there are brutes all around. And when you walk you have to look out for the cans dropped in the street in front of you."

Armani (pictured above with actress Camilla Belle), who has built his empire on understated elegance, anticipated claims that he was suffering from a bout of rosy-hued nostalgia (many would see it, rather, as a case of grumpy old signor-itis). "The world changes - I do not want to hark back to the olden days and reject the new." (Continued below)

Other highlights of the fashion week were Donatella Versace dedicating her latest collection to Barack Obama - she claims that the Senator is "a relaxed man who doesn't need to flex muscles to show he has power" - and Vivienne Westwood using Roma gypsies as catwalk models, complete with gold teeth and enormous medallions. This was a brave move considering that Italians have launched a series of xenophobic attacks against immigrants in recent months, who they blame for much of the crime in the country