Gianni was at that point one of the most powerful people in fashion. His shows were the highlight of the international cultural calendar. His friends were Elton John, Diana, Naomi, Courtney. He had made Versace something Italian fashion hadn't seen before, a brand as loud and proud of Italian heritage as it was beautiful.

Sister Donatella was at his side. His muse, confidant and sharpest critic. She said later that she always knew what he was thinking before he said it. He had shaped her since she was eleven, dyed her hair, dressed her, made her his canvas for new fashion ideas. 

Five years later after this image was taken, Gianni would be found shot dead outside his Miami villa. Donatella took over the brand, something she had never counted on and for which she said, by her own admission, she was never ready. The fashion industry, normally a shark tank, received her with all the goodwill it could muster. But goodwill doesn't build collections.

The first years were brutal: her designs didn't convince, the press caricatured her as a walking tragedy on high heels, held together by champagne, cigarettes and surgery. On Allegra's birthday, to whom Gianni had bequeathed the majority of the company, Elton John personally put her on a plane to rehab.

It took seven years before the industry took her seriously again. She found not only her way out of addiction but a direction for the brand. Where Gianni always designed with his head in the clouds, Donatella brought Versace back to earth, opulence without losing touch with the women who wore the clothes. As a woman, she understood what her customers needed. Versace became not just a creative spectacle but wearable luxury for all occasions.

Twenty-eight years as creative director. In March she stepped back and handed the house to Dario Vitale. She stays on as Chief Brand Ambassador, the glamorous hostess of a house she and her brother once built together.

This iconic photograph is from before all of that. Just the family at lunch in the years when the empire was still his and the survival of it not yet hers to carry.