“Haute couture dresses have the unique and extraordinary character of art objects. They are among the last remaining things to be made by hand, by human hands whose value remains irreplaceable for they endow everything they create with qualities that a machine could never give them: poetry and life.”

Christian Dior 1957

Haute couture is seen as fashion at its most brilliant and most brazen. Since 1946, the House of Dior has maintained specialist ateliers to execute its couture designs. Divided into two streams: flou (soft dressmaking) and tailleur (tailoring), each under the supervision of a première (head), the workrooms are home to exceptional craftsmanship. Housing different material and technical specialities, employees in the flou focus on drapery, typically working with fine wools, crepes, chiffons and silk, while those in the tailleur handle heavy or dense materials used for suiting or daywear. Sometimes, however, different parts of the one outfit are sent to different workrooms, as in the case of the famous Bar suit, 1947.

During Dior’s heyday, there were twenty-eight workrooms across five buildings, with 572 staff. Today there are just sixty permanent staff across the two specialist workrooms. Yet surprisingly, little about the dressmaking process has changed: white lab coats are still worn; employees are still ranked according to skill and experience; a house model, selected by the designer, is still used; and the flow of work courses from an idea or sketch, to toile (prototype), to fitted result over two months for each collection.

In 2017, to coincide with the NGV’s House of Dior: Seventy years of Haute Couture, two new couture works were commissioned for the fashion and textiles collection with funds donated by the David Richards Bequest and the F&T Supporters Group. The first, Look 10, Bar Coat, 2012, was from Raf Simons debut couture collection for Dior, the second, Essence d’Herbier, 2017, from Maria Grazia Chiuri’s first collection for the house. Joining a previous work, Look 39, 2002, by John Galliano, acquired in 2002 the two more recent examples show the ever-evolving design language of the house as envisaged by subsequent creative directors. As part of the acquisition process, documentary photography and film footage was taken in order to reveal some of the specialist techniques, tools and production methods specific to the making of couture garments and to give a behind-the-scenes-glimpse into the Dior ateliers.

Bar Coat

Bar coat was presented as Look 10 from Raf Simons’ first couture collection for the House of Dior. The presentation drew heavily on the traditions of the house and the style codes of founder Christian Dior, in particular the use of the colour red and the silhouette of the iconic Bar suit of 1947. Yet the collection was also a projection of Simon’s own minimalist design sensibility, underscored by an appreciation of line and form.

Made in the tailleur, using traditional hand-stitching, picotage, pressing and moulding techniques for suiting, the cashmere coat took 180 hours to make. Comprised of fewer pattern pieces and with less hip padding than the original suit, Bar coat highlights Simon’s reductive approach to design.

ESSENCE D’HERBIER

Essence d’Herbier was commissioned by the NGV after Katie Somerville, Senior Curator Fashion and Textiles attended Maria Grazia Chiuri’s first Dior Couture show in Paris in January 2017. In July 2016, Chiuri became the seventh designer and first female artistic Director at Christian Dior and her couture debut coincided with the 70th anniversary of the house.

Essence d’Herbier references an early sample produced exclusively by French embroidery house Rébé for Christian Dior in the 1950s. Chiuri has used the exquisite floral design and motifs to form the embroidered surface of this dress, combining a sense of house history with her own youthful and romantic vision for couture.

Made in the tailleur because of the nature of the fabric and manner of construction, Essence d’Herbier was first sent to a specialist embroidery workshop, atelier Safrane Cortambert as ten individual organza panels: seven for the bodice and three for the skirt. Detailed instructions were pinned to the material denoting the exact position, colour, scale, thread count and beadwork necessary for the design. Stretched over a frame, the panels were then worked on by up to seven needleworkers, beginning with the floral sprays, followed by the surrounding raffia – which was first flattened, then spliced into fine strips for stitching into a surface of small raised loops – and finishing with the beadwork. Taking over a month and several thousand hours to complete, the embroidered panels were then returned to the tailleur for fitting, shaping and assembly on a mannequin.

During the 1950s house mannequins were integral to the running of a couture house, assisting in the development and sale of each garment. Every design in a collection was fitted on the girl chosen to model it in a process that took up to six weeks.

Dior recognised the critical role mannequins played in successfully conveying his designs and played an active role in their selection, stating, ‘they are the life of my dresses and I want my dresses to be happy’. He also aimed for a variety of ages, personalities and figures so that clients could envisage themselves in the dress.

Each season, his house mannequins presented upwards of 150 dresses in salon shows of close to two hours’ duration that were repeated multiple times over successive days for the press, buyers and clients. They also modelled the collection during private appointments for individual clients.

Svetlana Lloyd was 23 when she began working as a house model at Dior. In 1957, after only two seasons Lloyd was one of seven mannequins sent to Australia with Dior’s final collections. As the only English speaker, Lloyd was interviewed extensively by local newspapers.

Odile was another mannequin to visit Australia in 1957. A house model at Dior from 1953 until 1958, Odile’s career began when she fortuitously stepped into a lift with Monsieur Dior. Asking her what she was doing, Odile replied, “I work for (the designer) André Levasseur”, to which Dior countered, “Not any more, you work for me now”. Odile’s classic figure meant that more than twenty outfits in each collection were made just for her and she travelled with several of the collections to New York, South Africa and England.

Australian women were among the first outside of Paris to witness, model and purchase original Dior designs. Less than a week after Dior’s dramatic debut of February 1947, articles celebrating his talent appeared in local newspapers. By March, buyers from major department stores had added the House to their Paris itineraries, returning with the latest New Look garments for that year’s spring parades.

In 1948, Australians also saw the first-ever representative collection of original Dior fashions to be shown outside of Paris. Presented by David Jones, Sydney, the fifty-piece collection of day, cocktail and eveningwear was shown in Australia for two weeks, ahead of New York and London. Opening to great fanfare in Sydney on July 31, the extravaganza saw twelve flawlessly groomed Australian mannequins, most with nineteen-inch waists, parade the original Dior garments alongside thirty-four locally made reproductions. Audiences were completely enthralled.

When Dior died unexpectedly in October 1957 plans to bring a second major couture parade out to Australia were already in place. Organised by David Jones and the Australian Women’s Weekly, the event still went ahead and in late November eighty-three outfits from Dior’s final collection, Spindle (Fuseau), along with seven of Dior’s house mannequins, arrived. Included in the selection were model garments titled Sydney, Melbourne, Canberra and Wattle – a sure sign that Dior cherished Australia as much as Australia cherished Dior.

The NGV has been collecting fashion since 1948, however the first works by the House of Dior to enter the collection were Grenade, summer dress, 1958, by Yves Saint Laurent and Hat, 1968 by Marc Bohan, in 1972, evidence of a growing interest in contemporary fashion.

Since then, the NGV’s collection has grown in extraordinary ways, accompanied by an ambitious acquisition and exhibition program that has been consistently supported by the generosity of individual patrons and more recently, through the passion of the NGV Fashion and Textiles Supporters Group. Both have contributed significantly to the development of current exhibition, The House of Dior: Seventy years of Haute Couture.

NORMA AND STUART LESLIE

In 2002, Norma and Stuart Leslie supported the commissioning of a couture outfit, Look 39 from John Galliano’s provocative 2000 spring-summer collection for Dior.

KRYSTYNA CAMPBELL-PRETTY

A major donor with her late husband Harold, since 2005, and an NGV Foundation Board member since 2015, Krystyna Campbell-Pretty has been a passionate supporter of works of art, exhibitions and NGV Education programs and, in recent years, the driving force behind the transformation of the Gallery’s fashion and textiles collection. Over the last two years, Campbell-Pretty has purchased significant and long sought-after examples of early twentieth-century couture, including eleven key Dior works which are included in The House of Dior: Seventy Years of Haute Couture exhibition.

FASHION AND TEXTILES SUPPORTERS GROUP

Thanks to the timely support of the Fashion and Textiles Supporters Group the Fashion and Textiles department has been able to procure Sneaker heels by Raf Simons and, in combination with the David Richards Bequest, the wonderful Essence d’Herbier, 2017 for The House of Dior: Seventy Years of Haute Couture.

The DAVID RICHARDS BEQUEST

A key piece in the exhibition, Raf Simons Bar Coat, 2012, remade 2017 was commissioned from Dior with funds from the recent David Richards Bequest.

LINDA DORA FISHER

Gifted by Linda Fisher Dora in 2016, Monte Carlo is an important Christian Dior couture work from his influential spring–summer 1956, Flèche (arrow) line collection. The hallmark of this collection was a verticality, suggested by a high waist, oblique folded drapery and soft curves.

The well-dressed woman will possess an outfit for every occasion; by the word ‘outfit’ I mean everything that goes to make up perfection, planned and thought through to the last detail from the fur coat to the shoes.

Christian Dior, 1951

From its establishment, Dior’s vision for his couture house encompassed all aspects of what it meant to be fashionably well-dressed. Beyond garments, he envisaged a ‘top to toe’ approach to dressing that included hosiery, hats, shoes, bags, make-up and fragrances. In the early years, many accessories were designed by Christian Dior himself and created in collaboration with technical specialists, such as milliners, shoemakers and perfumers. Many of these items have become as important to the house’s identity as the couture collections they adorned. Over its seventy year history the House of Dior has collaborated with leading creatives in specialist fields, such as perfumer Paul Vacher, shoe designer Roger Vivier and milliner Stephen Jones.

Perfume

I think it is as important for a woman to have beautiful perfume as it is for her to have beautiful clothes.

Christian Dior, 1954

The launch of Dior’s first fashion collection in February 1947 was followed several months later by the official debut of his first fragrance, Miss Dior, named after his beloved younger sister Catherine. At the presentation of his first collection, Dior infused the salon with the scent of two quarts of Miss Dior, to create a sensory experience for the gathered the clients, journalists and buyers.

As important to his business as clothing, Dior’s perfumes were supported by striking advertising campaigns using René Gruau’s illustrations. Dior also promoted the connection between his perfumes and his fashion collections: the original Miss Dior bottle, designed by Fernand Guéry-Colas, was said to echo the archetypal line of the iconic Bar suit. In the decade between 1947 and 1957, several hundred couture outfits bore a name linked to perfumery, with scented flowers foremost among them.

Shoes

Shoe design was one area in which Dior could not claim past expertise or experience, and he was happy to enlist the skills of others. The most important creative relationship for Dior in relation to footwear was with French designer Roger Vivier, whom he first met socially in 1949. Their working relationship began in January 1953 and lasted for ten years. In recognition of his contirbution, Vivier’s name was stamped into the insole alongside that of Dior. Roger Vivier was the only person to enjoy the privilege of being a Dior co-signatory in this way. Vivier’s shoes for Dior are widely acknowledged as being as luxurious and influential as the clothing. His exquisite embroideries and opulent fabrics as well as his iconic heel silhouettes, such as the curving comma and towering stiletto, still resonate today.

Hats

With his previous experiences selling and illustrating millinery early in his career, Dior played a lead role in selecting and finessing the right hat for each of his garments. After working with external milliners to create his first two collections in 1947, Dior announced the establishment of his own millinery department in 1948, run by his confidante and muse Madame Mitzah Bricard. Since then, the only other milliner to exert such an influence is British milliner Stephen Jones, who has created the hats for Dior for the last twenty years. Collaborating with Galliano, then Simons and now Chiuri, Jones has demonstrated the important role that hats continue to play in extending and communicating the designer’s vision.

You began working for Christian Dior Couture in 1996, what had been the highlights of your millinery career up to that point?

Some of the highlights of my millinery career, of course opening my first shop in 1980, having the Princess of Wales as my first Royal client & starting to work in Paris in 1984.

Another Magazine recently described you as – A boy from Liverpool who ended up with an office at Dior! How did your role at Dior come about?

I had been working with John Galliano since 1993, even though I knew him from London, we never actually worked together. He invited me to work with him at Givenchy, which we did do for a year, which was the year he was there, and then when it was announced he was going to be the new creative director of Christian Dior, he invited me to work with him there. We actually went for lunch at Dior and he told me all about it, it was very very exciting!

I understand that the 1950s is a favourite period in millinery for you, what is it about this era that appeals to you in particular?

It was really one of the heydays of millinery, where hats were an essential part of a chic’s women’s wardrobe. They weren’t de rigueur as they had been before the second World War, but they were an essential part and almost a symbol of high fashion. The first sketches Monsieur Christian Dior sold were not of dresses, but of hats!

As part of your research do you regularly access the archives at Christian Dior?

Absolutely! I even prepared my own note in publication each season of Mr. Dior’s time, what was the basic silhouette and I have been to the archive to look into the programme notes of how those hats were described and the emotions they tried to evoke.

Could you describe your working process in designing, developing and creating the hats for a new collection at Christian Dior Couture?

I think about Christian Dior every day even though I live in London. We do so many collections and special projects too. I don’t necessarily do something to go with each particular look, I just try and reinterpret the spirit of the collection. That’s what is important, the spirit and not the silhouette. From there it goes into sketches and toiles, and fittings with the clothes, but working with each designer is a slightly different process.

Hat making frequently brings together the best of rational artisanal skills with contemporary innovation. Are there key people within the Dior Atelier who you have worked with to bring your pieces from concept to the catwalk?

Yes, there are, there is Silvana Slubicki, who is the head of the Workroom, whose parents both worked with Monsieur Dior, and she is an expert at French chic. However, I use many of the artisans in Paris to create different elements whether it’s flowers, metal work, plastics, furriers and embroiderers and all the different elements that could possibly go into a hat.

You have designed hats for Christian Dior Prêt a Porter, Baby, Ski, Golf, Rain and even Surf collections, how does your approach differ to that when you are creating for Christian Dior Couture?

Obviously for a couture house, for a couture dress, the hat is made individually to go with that particular outfit and that’s the big difference, where as if you’re doing Prêt-a-Porter the hat has to be a bit more general so that it can evoke the spirit of the season, but funny enough sometimes in the haute couture, what you need to have is a simple cotton hat. It is a little bit like having a salad in the middle of a very rich meal, it cleanses your palette.

Do you have any favorite collections or hats that you particularly enjoyed researching, developing and creating during your 20 years at Dior?

The hats at the Les Jardins de Bagatelle for autumn-winter 1997-98 couture, were particularly beautiful, it was an extraordinary collection. It was very much about historical research into Dior. Another one was the Egyptian Couture collection, Spring Summer 2004, which was John Galliano’s extravagance at its most extravagance. I also loved the flower collection, which was quite recently Autumn Winter 2010 Couture, where we made plastic visors, as they were ultimate in John Galliano’s modernity. At the moment as we speak today I have prepared 48 hats for this next Haute Couture for Maria Grazia Chiuri, so I don’t know exactly how many will go on… We shall have to wait and see.

You have worked with three creative directors at Dior – John Galliano, Raf Simons and Maria Grazi Chiuri – could you reflect on the different approaches and working methods that you have encountered in working with them?

With John Galliano, hats were part of his natural expression and when we went to Dior, he felt that they were something, which were not only of his natural expression but of Dior’s natural expression, so that’s why it was a perfect match. Also he loved fashion with a capital ‘F’ so hats really turn up the volume. Raf Simons approach was completely different. Hats to him were very powerful talisman, which we used to indicate a touch of the past, or a sense of purity and beauty, but they were very much a sign not a reality, which is often why he didn’t do hats. Maria Grazia Chiuri, she believes that a woman that she is there to create, to enable women to create their own self-expression, and she sees that young people love wearing hats, so naturally hats are there for her. To not do hats would almost be denying her public something that they love.

How do you see the role of millinery in the world of contemporary couture?

As John Galliano once said, ‘If you’re a dress designer, why would you stop at the neck?’