Fashion In Paris

Paris has been the international capital of fashion for more than 300 years. Even before the rise of the haute couture, Parisians were notorious for their obsession with fashion, and foreigners eagerly followed their lead. From Charles Frederick Worth to Gabrielle "Coco†? Chanel, Christian Dior, and Yves Saint Laurent, fashion history is dominated by the names of Parisian couturiers. But Valerie Steele's Paris Fashion is much more than just a history of great designers. This fascinating book demonstrates that the success of Paris ultimately rests on the strength of its fashion culture – created by a host of fashion performers and spectators, including actresses, dandies, milliners, artists, and writers. First published in 1988 to great international acclaim, this pioneering book has now been completely revised and brought up to date, encompassing the rise of fashion's multiple world cities in the 21st century. Lavishly illustrated, deeply learned, and elegantly written, Valerie Steele's masterwork explores with brilliance and flair why Paris remains the capital of fashion.

The Fashion Insider's Guide to Paris is a carefully curated compendium of the current hotspots, classic haunts and hidden gems of one of the world's greatest fashion destinations.

Even before the advent of haute couture, Paris was a great centre of fashion. During the second half of the nineteenth century, when the capital was transformed by an ambitious urban plan, its residents responded in kind, wearing styles as polished and modern as the city itself in order to participate in the exciting new social scene. Featuring famed paintings by such Impressionist masters as Degas, Cassatt, Manet, Monet and Morisot, this delightful book revisits the world of Parisian fashion through the eyes of first-hand observers. Thematic chapters present a gallery-like ensemble of paintings that follow in the footsteps of stylish Parisians as they stroll in the parks and boulevards, meet friends at cafés, take in the theatre, relax at home and go on holiday. In an extended narrative-style caption to accompany each image, fashion and art historian Debra N. Mancoff offers a detailed discussion of what men and women wore and how their dress defined them. To complete the picture, illustrated interludes, providing glimpses into dressmaking, corsetry and millinery, the origins of couture and the rise of the department store, reveal how Paris became the fashion capital of the world.

“If you are lucky enough to have lived in Paris as a young man, then wherever you go for the rest of your life, it stays with you, for Paris is a moveable feast,” Ernest Hemingway once said. Bénédicte Burguet-Journé explores the perennial question of what is it about Paris that makes it so unique, so inspiriting, and attractive for creatives from all around the world. The book presents a series of leisurely interviews with leading fashion designers: Jean-Charles de Castelbajac, Maroussia Rebecq, Kym Ellery, Bruno Frisoni, Jean Paul Gaultier, Martin Grant, Guillaume Henry, Journ/né, Christelle Kocher, Rabih Kayrouz, Julie de Libran, Roland Mouret, Vanessa Seward, Junko Shimada, Alexandre Vauthier. In the prologue, Olivier Saillard muses about the impact fashion has had on the city’s urban canvas, and how it all started with an Englishman. In the epilogue, Sarah Andelman, former founder and artistic director of the infamous Parisian shop colette, pays tribute to the light and sense of freedom that goes hand in hand with the Parisian spirit. About the author As a journalist and editor, Bénédicte Burguet-Journé has been a specialist lifestyle writer for Le Figaro and a lifestyle and fashion editor for Vanity Fair France; she is also a political correspondent for Shanghai Daily. Burguet specializes in fashion, jewellery, and watches, attending all the major fashion weeks and luxury fairs. www.benedicte-burguet.com

Paris, Capital of Fashion accompanies a major exhibition at The Museum at FIT, New York's only museum dedicated solely to the art of fashion. This lavishly-illustrated book is edited by MFIT's director and chief curator, Valerie Steele, also the author of the acclaimed Paris Fashion: A Cultural History. This new book opens with an important essay on how and why Paris became famous as the international “capital of fashion.” Steele traces how the mythic “aura” of Paris fashion was constructed over generations, as the splendour of the court at Versailles came to be echoed by the spectacle of the haute couture. Yet Paris has faced repeated challenges from other fashion capitals, especially London, Milan, and New York. Essays by Christopher Breward, David Gilbert, Grazia d'Annunzio, and Antonia Finnane place Paris within a broader global narrative, while Sophie Kurkdjian investigates the cultural value of the Parisian couture, and Agnès Rocomora explores the online imagery of the chic Parisienne. As The New Yorker recently put it, Paris is “the most glamorous and competitive of the world's fashion capitals.” No other city has been branded “Fashion” as Paris has. By opening the study of Paris fashion to new approaches, this book explains why Paris still retains its position as the world's undisputed fashion capital.

The glamour and excitement of the Parisian fashion scene explodes onto the page in these bold portraits and drawings of Paris by rising star and couture insider Marc-Antoine Coulon. With an unwavering hand and a riot of color, Marc-Antoine Coulon captures Paris fashion on and off the runway. His pared-down, ultra-glamorous sketches--portraits of designers, screen stars, and his favorite Parisian haunts from day to night--are rendered here with incisive and unique artistry. Coulon's watercolors, collages, and sketches, paired with handwritten observations and pithy quotations, transcend the page. The artist's distinctive style--inspired by the great masters René Gruau and Erté--is both timeless and iconic, with a decidedly contemporary edge that is at once elegant, sexy, vibrant, and witty. Fashion icon Ines de la Fressange acknowledges his artistic courage: with a bold, saturated background, a confident brushstroke, or the force of negative space, his drawings sublimate his subjects--whether a dress, a monument, or a celebrity. As fashion illustration enjoys a renaissance in magazines and couture campaigns, Coulon's drawings have been commissioned by everyone from Vogue to Dior to private collectors. They offer readers a joyful and breathless tour of everything fashionable in Paris.

An innovative history of the fashion industry, focusing on the connections between Paris and New York, art and finance, and design and manufacturing. Fashion is one of the most dynamic industries in the world, with an annual retail value of $3 trillion and globally recognized icons like Coco Chanel, Christian Dior, and Yves Saint Laurent. How did this industry generate such economic and symbolic capital? Focusing on the roles of entrepreneurs, designers, and institutions in fashion’s two most important twentieth-century centers, Paris to New York tells the history of the industry as a negotiation between art and commerce. In the late nineteenth century, Paris-based firms set the tone for a global fashion culture nurtured by artistic visionaries. In the burgeoning New York industry, however, the focus was on mass production. American buyers, trend scouts, and designers crossed the Atlantic to attend couture openings, where they were inspired by, and often accused of counterfeiting, designs made in Paris. For their part, Paris couturiers traveled to New York to understand what American consumers wanted and to make deals with local manufacturers for whom they designed exclusive garments and accessories. The cooperation and competition between the two continents transformed the fashion industry in the early and mid-twentieth century, producing a hybrid of art and commodity. Véronique Pouillard shows how the Paris–New York connection gave way in the 1960s to a network of widely distributed design and manufacturing centers. Since then, fashion has diversified. Tastes are no longer set by elites alone, but come from the street and from countercultures, and the business of fashion has transformed into a global enterprise.

A comprehensive biography of the late designer, Karl Lagerfeld, and his infamous rivalry with Yves Saint Laurent. In the 1970s, Paris fashion exploded like a champagne bottle left out in the sun. Amid sequins and longing, celebrities and aspirants flocked to the heart of chic, and Paris became a hothouse of revelry, intrigue, and searing ambition. At the center of it all were fashion's most beloved luminaries - Yves Saint Laurent, the reclusive enfant terrible, and Karl Lagerfeld, the flamboyant freelancer with a talent for reinvention - and they divided Paris into two fabulous halves. Their enduring rivalry is chronicled in this dazzling exposè of an era: of social ambitions, shared obsessions, and the mesmerizing quest for beauty. "Deliciously dramatic... The Beautiful Fall crackles with excitement."-New York Times Book Review "Fascinating." -New York Times "Addictive." -Philadelphia Inquirer "It's like US Weekly, 1970s style." -Gotham "A story constructed as exquisitely as a couture dress. . . . It moves stylishly forward, with frequent over-the-shoulder glances at some very dishy background." -Boston Globe