The man who saved Armani

Last week, Giorgio Armani was celebrating in London. On Tuesday night, he partied with Donatella Versace, Robert de Niro and Richard Gere at the Royal Academy to mark the opening of a retrospective of his work. On Wednesday he was at the Albert Hall for the Fashion Rocks show, a glorious clash of egos which saw designers and rock stars trying to outdo each other.

At both events, Armani, perfectlygroomed if portly, cut a somewhat aloof figure. His close friends, however, detected something quite different about him. He was a man transformed, they said. "Giorgio was back as himself," a renowned fashion author said, "laughing and enjoying life again. He hasn't been like that for some time."

For, despite his trappings of glamour and a fortune estimated at nearly £500 million, Armani's friends speak of a man beset by profound loneliness and who still grieves for the man he loved more than any other - former business and romantic partner, Sergio Galeotti, who died of Aids in 1985. If Armani is changed, friends maintain, it is because of a 36-year old Scottish designer named Graeme Black. "They are extremely close," one told me. "Giorgio is reserved, a very quiet figure in private, whereas Graeme is gutsy, lively, very showy. They complement each other perfectly."

In the bitchy world of fashion, some are now beginning to refer to Black dismissively as "Armani's wife". What is striking about the young Scot and the Italian maestro is their remarkably similar backgrounds. Armani sees in Black a boy, like his former self, from an anonymous, mundane place who hungered to work in haute couture.

They first met when Black joined Armani's fashion empire as a lowly assistant in his mid-twenties, just over 10 years ago. "But in the last couple of years," Armani's friend goes on, "they have formed a very close bond." Black - now in demand in his own right - has an apartment near Armani's in Milan.

Armani's origins, in a small town outside Milan, were humble. Black is from the tiny seaside town of Carnoustie, near Dundee. Like Armani, he longed to escape and eventually studied fashion in Edinburgh, before moving to London in the early Nineties, where he worked for designers Zandra Rhodes and John Galliano. Shortly after, he landed a highlycoveted job at Armani's Milan headquarters, and his professional and private life took an extraordinary turn. Despite the age difference - Armani is 67 - and the fact Black was an employee, their friendship blossomed and survived even Black's move three years ago to one of Armani's competitors, Ferragamo.

Armani has invited Black's parents, Marion and Ernest, to holiday with him in Tuscany. A few days ago they dined at his Milan home. "He is a very charming man," Marion told me. "We have been on holiday with him a number of times, even to his sister's house. He really has been very generous to us."

She explained that her son was captivated from an early age by fashion and the arts: "Graeme would make dresses for his younger sister Helen when he was very little, and was always interested in hair and how people looked. I think he has got his creative side from my own sister, who used to draw. Graeme also liked drawing and painting. But fashion was always what he wanted to do, and Italy was always where he wanted to be."

In 1993 his parents scraped together enough money for him to go to Milan. "We supported him as much as we could, but we're not rich," she said. He lived in cheap digs, hawking his portfolio of designs around during the day and working in a bar in the evenings. "He so, so wanted to be a success."

Armani's company rejected him at first, but after three interviews he got the job. And then he met Giorgio. Armani was still lamenting the death of Galeotti, whom he had first met when he was a struggling designer and Galeotti, 10 years younger, was a wealthy playboy. For years they kept secret how close they were. Meanwhile, they built a design empire with 200 outlets in 33 countries. "The truth is he has not really had anyone, apart from his direct family, with which to enjoy his success," a friend told me.

Now the "old Gio" is back, and it looks like it's all down to the young Scot - "a man from nowhere who has now made it big time", according to one observer. Last year, in an unprecedented gesture, Armani sat in the front row for Black's Ferragamo show in Milan.

He obviously adores his protégé, and his friends welcome the new spring in his step.

Now the Blacks wonder whether the great Giorgio will be visiting their house in Carnoustie, whose living-room wall features a painting of the playwright Somerset Maugham which their son painted as a boy. "We are terribly proud of him," says Marion.