“We have to be ready for a bumpy ride,” Gildo Zegna, chief executive of Italian fashion house Ermenegildo Zegna, tells the Financial Times while thrusting the arms of his blue silk jacket above the desk of his Milan office.

Mr Zegna says the men’s luxury fashion house expects revenue growth of slightly above 10 per cent this year, even as he warns that the Chinese market will grow more slowly than it has over the past decade.

“The growth of 20-30 per cent we have seen in China can’t continue,” he says. “That doesn’t mean the market will stop growing, but it means we have to adjust to 10-15 per cent growth there. I wish every country we are in grew like that.” His warning comes as Bain & Co, the consultancy, is today expected to cut its forecast for growth in the mainland Chinese luxury goods market.