Andrea Sassetti (born 1960)[1] is an Italian shoe designer, owner of the Italian fashion company Andrea Moda, a brand of high-end women's shoes.[2] Born in Fermo, he was also the owner of a Formula One motor racing team Andrea Moda Formula in 1992. The origin of Sassetti's fortune remain blurred; some sources attribute it to his father, Silvano Sassetti, a wealthy shoe manufacturer. Others suggest that he won a huge sum playing poker in the 1980s or hint at links with the mafia and illegal trade. According to a telephone interview published on the internet, Sassetti was born into a family of poor peasants who grew rich by working and earning money through gambling.[3][4]
When preparing for the 1992 Formula One World Championship, the headquarters of Andrea Moda Formula was installed in the former workshops of the Coloni team, Passignano sul Trasimeno, a small town in central Italy.[5][6] The new team, which had forty employees, continued to use the materials from the old team; according to several observers, Sassetti had very little, if any, additional funding invested in improving the infrastructure, which could have denoted a lack of seriousness of the new racing structure.[6][7]
In January 1992, in order to complete his racing staff, Sassetti set out to recruit, among others, a mechanic and truck driver from among the workers at his shoe factory.[5] During 1992, a suspected case of arson destroyed Sassetti's discothèque on the east coast of Italy, and as he fled from the flames, a gunman shot at him but missed.[8] He now runs restaurants and nightclubs, and is involved in the construction business. Still interested in the sport, he had a home until the early 2000s with the two original Andrea Moda S921 cars; the cars subsequently disappeared.[9]
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