2 MIN READ
Beppe Angiolini was a pioneer of fashion. He had deep taste, an aesthetic sensibility and a rare intuition in recognizing new talents and spotting those moments when a brand reached its greatest cultural and aesthetic expression. He knew how to read collections, anticipate trends and turn his intuitions into successful commercial choices. Beppe was someone who knew how to get things done. And he did them well.
In his Arezzo, Beppe had made Sugar a sort of permanent center of gravity of fashion. He started in 1978 with a small boutique, then came other stores, new collections and finally Palazzo Lambardi, inaugurated in 2018. For its restoration he chose Vincenzo De Cotiis, an architect and designer who succeeded in making frescoes and ancient Roman mosaics coexist with contemporary furnishings and materials. But Beppe wanted something more than a large store. So, next to the boutique, came Sugar Rooms, a period residence, the bistro No Sugar Please and spaces dedicated to art. Every environment carried his imprint, that personal taste that could also be recognized in the collections he chose.
Not by chance, in August 2026, The Business of Fashion included Sugar among the 65 best independent multi-brand stores in the world.
But the real commercial colossus built by Beppe was the digital one. With Sugar.it, launched in 2016, he had developed an e-commerce capable of bringing his selections to international markets, from Europe to America to the East. Thanks to a broad commercial vision and consolidated relationships with the big brands, he was able to offer top-level collections both in the physical store and online. Already in 2018 digital accounted for the largest part of Sugar’s revenue. A result that shows how well Beppe knew how to turn his own taste into a business able to compete on world markets.
President for several terms of the Camera Italiana Buyer Moda and later honorary president of Camera Buyer Italia, Beppe was a reference point for the whole sector. He knew the product, the designers, the companies and above all he knew how to recognize talent before it became famous.
It was a pleasure to meet and greet him in Florence, during Pitti Uomo, or at Milan Fashion Week or in Paris. Curious, attentive, with that ability to look ahead that he never lost.
With him probably goes a world that will not return. That of the great independent buyers, able to steer taste and build a commercial identity through their own choices. Today, while fashion goes through a cultural transformation whose outcome we do not yet know, his passing makes even clearer how important that figure was.
I am left with one regret. The last time we spoke we had agreed on an interview which, due to a series of circumstances, we were not able to carry out.
A hug, my friend. Have a good journey to your last destination.
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Alessandro Sicuro
Brand Strategist | Photographer | Art Director | Project Manager
Alessandro Sicuro Comunication
