Valentino -- designer who wanted women to be beautiful

By Rachel Sanderson

PARIS (Reuters) - Valentino, who retired on Wednesday after staging his last haute couture show, became a by-word for glamour during nearly half a century dressing stars and royalty in his lipstick-red gowns.

The dapper Italian, who first tasted international fame when Jacqueline Kennedy asked him to design the dress for her marriage to Aristotle Onassis, is considered one of the last great designers alongside Karl Lagerfeld and Giorgio Armani.

His farewell show in the grounds of the Rodin Museum in Paris was a more subdued affair than a three-day extravaganza held in Rome last July celebrating 45 years at the top of his trade and widely considered a prelude to his retirement.

While a cast of stars and heiresses including actress Uma Thurman and Mick Jagger partied among Rome's ruins and palaces, Valentino recalled what set him on the path to being considered one of the late 20th century's most influential designers.

"I'm a disaster in everything else, but dress designing I can do," he said.

Famous as much for his extravagant lifestyle and decadent parties as his show-stopping gowns, Valentino was born to a more simple life in 1932 in Voghera, northern Italy, where he credited his mother for giving him a taste for fashion.

GLAMOROUS WOMEN

Valentino left Italy's industrial north for Paris when only 17 to learn the trade of haute couture and never looked back thanks to an aim to make women look beautiful.