Gucci Is The Latest Luxury Style Brand To Join Formula One’s Incredible Run For Premium Customers

It started as a small whisper among credible F1 bloggers and regarded GP news channels, trending a month back and—like the plethora of F1 rumours cycling through cyberspace—it had a nominal possibility of being true with one prescient caveat. “If it were any other team they were shooting for, it’d be dismissible. But Alpine, hmm, that is an interesting tie-up,” said F1 News TacticalRab.

Within a week of that, it was confirmed: Gucci—the most powerful brand in the Kering group—will be the main sponsor of the Alpine Formula One team, the first time a luxury fashion brand has served as a title sponsor for F1 (Flavio Briatore, former Benetton race principal, might contest that, but more on that later). “Gucci Racing is more than a presence on the grid: it is an expression of who we are and where we want to take the brand. And there is much more to come. We are grateful to Alpine and the entire Renault Group for sharing this ambition with us,” Francesca Bellettini, president and CEO of Gucci, enthusiastically stated.

Without a doubt, it is a moment not only for Gucci but for fashion in general, capping a trend in this 2026 season that marks a seismic shift in how luxury engages with motorsports. In fact, it could be argued that this season becomes the year that the top-tier style and fashion brands finally took the leap, where watch (Rolex, IWC, Hublot, etc.) and spirits (Heineken, Moët, Johnnie Walker, Hennessy, etc.) brands are magnetically drawn to where automotive’s biggest names, like Ferrari, Mercedes, McLaren, Alpine, Audi and others, have long been. Fashion is ready to take the steering wheel of F1.

Witness this year’s incredible decision for LVMH to take the main title sponsorship of the whole Formula One grid, a massive move by the house that Arnault built to align with motorsports when, previously, competitive sailing was its domain. And Kering—headed by François Pinault, a competitor of LVMH’s Bernard Arnault for art and luxury commerce—was not to be overshadowed for this opportunity on one of the hottest branding tickets. F1 has always been seen as a top place to capture the wealthiest consumers in the world, the so-called travelling circus known for its ultra-glamour pedigree and global reach from aspirational locations like Monaco, Las Vegas, Singapore, and 21 other countries.

This move was abetted by Drive to Survive, the Netflix show that absolutely catapulted F1 into the stratosphere, driving teams’ worth into the billions and sponsorships into the seven figures. With an ecosystem of private equity investment, the biggest advertising budgets in the world, and media mastery, it’s no surprise that F1 is seen as the gold standard of premium sponsorship.

How the Gucci sponsorship came about is a modern story of F1 made manifest. Alpine, a French motoring brand that took over the F1 seat from Renault Racing some years back, recently attracted investors looking to jump into this exciting investment area. In fact, Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney—Reynolds’ It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia co-star and Wrexham AFC co-owner—investing through Maximum Effort Investments (along with actor Michael B. Jordan as a co-investor), joined Otro Capital and RedBird Capital Partners to acquire a combined 24 per cent equity stake in Alpine Racing for €200 million (US$218 million), valuing the team at around US$900 million. Alpine going Hollywood gave it a flex that few other F1 brands had, and its cache rose.

Enter Luca de Meo. De Meo was previously Renault Group CEO and a driving force behind Alpine’s F1 programme, before becoming CEO of Gucci’s parent company, Kering—making this deal a very natural bridge between the two worlds. The deal was also spearheaded on Alpine’s side by executive advisor Flavio Briatore, who notably brought another fashion house—Benetton—to F1 title success in the early 1990s. “Formula One has evolved far beyond sport to become one of the world’s most powerful premium content platforms, reaching over 1.5 billion people each season and inspiring a rapidly expanding, younger, and increasingly female audience. As a space of creativity, pursuit of excellence, and human achievement, we see it as a unique platform for a luxury brand to push boundaries, spark meaningful connections, and build long-term value and brand desirability, while delivering measurable and lasting impact,” describes de Meo of the whole sponsorship deal that will fall under an umbrella organisation called Gucci Racing, which sports a new logo, and promises experiential textures and Gucci-driven products.

It promises to be an exciting addition to F1’s burgeoning fashion credentials. But there is one last element to factor in: will Gucci be joining a winning racing team, one that will take this sponsorship as an investment into its competitiveness and lift the Alpine team—and Gucci—onto the winners’ podium? The race starts in 2027 and, although it’s unlikely the Gucci collaboration will equate to a championship, if de Meo and Briatore have their way, nothing less will suffice.

Gucci | Formula One

Image credits: Jean-François Robert