Who hasn’t heard of Coco Channel, Yves Saint Laurent or Christian Dior? Balenciaga's name is not familiar to you? However, all these fashion designers have marked the history of their discipline by the originality of their artistic creations, their daring, disrupting established codes and launching completely new styles of clothing.
Coco Channel
From her real name, Gabrielle Chasnel, known as "Coco Chanel", one of the greatest designers in the history of fashion, milliner and great French seamstress, made famous for her haute couture creations and her perfumes (who does not know the Chanel No. 5?). Her first artistic work is on original hats that she wears very low on the front and which have a certain success. In 1915, in the city of Biarritz, she opened her first fashion houses. She begins to be known for her work on skirts, which she shortens and then on the size, which she tends to remove on her creations and in her sewing classes. In 1918, just after the end of the war, she headed a very important fashion house, which employed more than 300 seamstresses. In 1921, she opened her second studio in rue Cambon, near Place Vendôme and in 1926; her "little black dress" was a real success. Coco is also the first major seamstress to launch its range of fragrances.
Mary Quant
Another great British seamstress! Ladies, you are obliged to remember this name because you owe your mini-skirts to this lady! First managing a clothing store on Kings Road in London, the young woman decided to create her own clothing line. She invents the mini-skirt in the 1960s even though it was also proposed in the creations of André Courrèges. She will for a long time be the symbol of fashion in the English capital before taking an interest at the end of her career in home accessories and make-up.
The great male fashion designers
Paul Poiret
A great French designer, born in 1879 and died in 1944, he is considered a forerunner of the Art Deco style.
Yves Saint Laurent
One of the most famous fashion designers in the world, so famous that his life was the subject of a film, released in 2014, and starring Gaspard Ulliel in the role of the lost fashion master.
Christian Dior
Christian Dior went through “Ecole de la Chambre Syndicale de la Couture” before being recruited as an assistant by “Maison Dior”. He takes over the artistic direction at the death of Christian Dior. He decides to create his own fashion house with his partner, Pierre Bergé, and thanks to the support of an American financier.