Three Women, One City: How Luca de Meo Put Sabina Belli, Charlotte Fournet and Krizia Cucurachi in Charge of Kering in Milan

Sabina Belli and Kering Italia: One Voice for a Quarter of the Global Workforce

Kering Italia carries enormous institutional weight. More than 25% of Kering’s global workforce is anchored in Italy, a footprint bolstered by thousands of indirect manufacturing and logistics jobs. The country serves as the industrial engine for the group’s houses, including Gucci, Bottega Veneta, Brioni, Pomellato, DoDo, Ginori 1735 and Kering Eyewear.

As president, Belli will serve as the collective voice for Kering’s Italian operations, steering delicate dialogues with public institutions, trade associations and industrial stakeholders. She also retains her leadership of the Kering Accademia per le Eccellenze, an academy dedicated to preserving Italian craftsmanship. De Meo credited Belli with a deep understanding of the Italian luxury ecosystem and a proven ability to forge alliances across business, education and government.

This diplomatic capital matters. Belli’s long-standing leadership of Pomellato for Women and her seat on the board of the Kering Foundation give the group a credible voice on social questions at a time when Italian luxury faces sharp ethical scrutiny. As Altagamma’s vice president for jewellery and manufacturing talent, she also sits where the industry debates the future of its skilled workforce, the same artisans at the centre of the supply-chain investigations.

Navigation of a Fractured Supply Chain

Belli’s diplomatic skills will face an immediate test. Her appointment follows a tumultuous period for the Italian luxury supply chain. In December 2025, Milan prosecutors targeted thirteen fashion houses, including Kering’s Gucci, Yves Saint Laurent Manifatture and Alexander McQueen Italia, demanding corporate governance and supply-chain records as part of a sweeping worker exploitation probe. None of the thirteen was placed under formal investigation or court administration, since only small volumes of their goods were traced to the inspected workshops, yet the wider industry felt the shockwaves.

Peer brands, including Loro Piana, Giorgio Armani Operations, Dior’s manufacturing arm, Alviero Martini and Valentino Bags Lab, had previously been placed under temporary judicial administration to correct compliance failures. Under Italian corporate liability law, brands can be held responsible for offences committed in their interest by approved subcontractors. The crackdown has pushed luxury groups to overhaul supply-chain oversight, adopt tracking technologies and vertically integrate key suppliers, making Belli’s institutional role critical to Kering’s legal and reputational stability.

Sabina Belli: From Dior to Pomellato

Belli brings a deep luxury pedigree to the presidency, having held senior roles at WPP, L’Oréal Luxe and LVMH, including Christian Dior Parfums, Moët Hennessy, Veuve Clicquot and Bulgari. On taking the reins at Pomellato in 2015, she sought out Rabolini himself, who generously agreed to meet her. In 2017, she established Pomellato for Women, a global advocacy platform for gender equality. She serves on the board of the Kering Foundation and holds the vice presidency for jewellery and manufacturing talent at Altagamma.

Charlotte Fournet’s Race Against the 2028 Profitability Deadline

At Pomellato, Charlotte Fournet inherits a house facing a ticking clock. An Emlyon business school graduate with more than 14 years of merchandising and product strategy experience across Saint Laurent, Gucci and Bottega Veneta, Fournet is tasked with sharpening the brand’s positioning, driving retail productivity and expanding distribution selectively.

Her appointment coincides with a strict mandate issued by de Meo in May, which gave four of Kering’s smaller houses, including Pomellato, until April 2028 to prove their profitability. The jeweller has fought back with strong recent growth in Japan and North America, as highlighted in The Silent Luxury’s first-half analysis, but the pressure to deliver sustainable margins remains immense.

Fournet’s deployment follows the commercial discipline at the heart of de Meo’s turnaround. As Collection Merchandising Director at Bottega Veneta, she oversaw merchandising across jewellery, accessories, leather goods and ready-to-wear, the discipline that decides which pieces a boutique carries, in what depth and at what price. Her Pomellato mandate points to exactly that lever: more productivity per store and a selective expansion of distribution, the most direct route to the basis points still missing from Kering Jewelry’s operating margin. The network is already moving that way. In the first half, Kering Jewelry opened four net stores in Asia-Pacific and two in Japan, while the group’s fashion houses closed 31 in the same region.

Krizia Cucurachi Restructures DoDo

Concurrently, Krizia Cucurachi takes over as CEO of DoDo, Pomellato’s younger, more accessible sister label known for its whimsical animal charms. Succeeding Teejana Beenessreesingh, Cucurachi joined DoDo in 2024 as global product and brand director, following a decade-long tenure at Swarovski and earlier marketing roles at L’Oréal and Lindt & Sprüngli. Her mandate centres on consolidating DoDo’s position in the gift-jewellery segment.

The pivot draws on Cucurachi’s international experience. After more than ten years at Swarovski, a brand sold worldwide through its own boutiques, and two years shaping DoDo’s product and image from within, she is tasked with keeping the brand strong in its Italian home market while growing it in selected international markets. For a house built on charms, product and brand are the levers that carry it from one country to the next.

While Kering Jewelry’s 20% growth to €521 million in the first half of 2026 outpaces a fashion division in which Gucci’s sales fell 5%, its 6.2% recurring operating margin remains an Achilles’ heel. It sits far below the lucrative 23% margin achieved by Kering Eyewear. Closing this profitability gap is the primary challenge facing Fournet and Cucurachi as they look to turn Kering’s jewellery division from a high-growth business into a high-margin powerhouse.