Christian DiorDior's career came at the fulcrum of the twentieth century. He successfully combined the historicism of the late-nineteenth-century Belle Epoque with the aesthetic and technical innovations of his own time. In Dior's works, what outwardly seems sheer romance and poetry is strengthened by structural underpinnings that demonstrate deep knowledge of craft. And while each collection is individualized even by name, the overall work created during the eleven years Dior built his art can be seen as a unit of interwoven development. From the inception of The New Look on February 12, 1947, until the designer's death in 1957, Dior was the definitive force in fashion. In addition, his corpus was to become an overriding influence on subsequent fashion. Authors Richard Martin and Harold Koda, curator and associate curator, respectively, of The Costume Institute, present that corpus chronologically, and they also consider each piece as an artistic attainment and the whole as an artistic enterprise. Dior is viewed through his personal aesthetic: attention is paid to his deliberate stylistic evolution, his historicism, and his characteristic style gestures, called "Diorisms". Thus, Dior is reconsidered as a designer of artistic conviction and cautious style. Without denying Dior his magic, the photographs and texts in this book show him as a designer of skilled system and intelligence. The suite of more than 150 photographs, made expressly for this volume and published here for the first time, document the greatest collection of Dior's work in the world, which resides in The Costume Institute. |
Contents
Sponsors Statement | |
Foreword by Philippe de Montebello | |
Introduction | |
Copyright | |
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A-line afternoon dress anchored artist Balenciaga ball gown beads Belle Époque Black silk Black wool bodice body bust button Byron Carmel Snow center-front Chanel Chérie Christian Dior clients cloth cocktail dress collar Compiègne construction couture created Cristobal Balenciaga cummerbund David Kluger day coat day dress decade décolletage decorative designer's dinner dress Dior dress Dior's Diorism draped drapery dress and detail effect elements ensemble fabric fall fall-winter fashion feminine folding garden garment Gift of Christian gown and detail Gray Harper's Bazaar Henry Rogers Benjamin hipline hips horsehair braid jacket lace layer Look luxury menswear moiré Navy-blue neckline organza pattern pieces Pink silk Pisanello pleats postwar scalloped seam Second Empire sequin embroidery sequins shape shoulder silhouette silk faille silk organza silk satin skirt sleeve spring collection spring-summer 1953 strapless structure style suggests suit surface tailoring textile tion trim trompe l'oeil waist waistline White silk wrap