From July 5, the Musée des arts décoratifs will celebrates the 70th anniversary of the creation of the house of Dior. The exhibition invites visitors on a journey of discovery through the house of Dior’s founder and the Yves saint laurent, Marc Bohan, Gianfranco Ferré, John Galliano, Raf Simons and, most recently, Maria Grazia Chiuri. Over 300 Haute Couture gowns, jewelery, bags, shoes and perfume bottles designed between 1947 and the present will be present. Florence Müller and Olivier Gabet are the curators of the exhibition that unites the Museum’s fashion areas and the nave for the first time.
This new retrospective shows how Christian Dior and the six artistic directors built up the influence of a name that is the very embodiment of Haute Couture in Drance and throughout the world. This exploration of Haute Couture is enriched with Fredéric Castet’s designs, beauty creations by Derge Lutens, Tyen and Peter Philips, as perfume creations by François Demachy.
In 1947, Christian Dior took the feminine shape in a totally new direction, with the new look his dresses expressed a modern femininity. He invented an internationally-focused couture that put Paris back in the spotlight as the capital of fashion.
Christian Dior’s life opens the exhibition, were paintings, sculptures and decorative objets d’art illustrate the couturier’s tastes and sources of inspiration as well as a creative sensibility are shared by all.
The visit continues in the nave with a chronological display spanning the 70 years from 1947 to 2017, showing the legacy of the Dior spirit down the years. A succession of six galleries is dedicated to these figures, analyzing how their designs contributed to the quest to stay faithful to Dior’s vision of Haute Couture.
The exhibition ends in the lavish setting of the nave, transformed into a ballroom for a presentation of a series of truly sumptuous ball gowns, including several glittering creations seen together for the first time in paris. Some of them worn by famous customers who have helped to build the success of the house of dior, like princess Grace of Monaco, princess Diana, Charlize Theron and Jennifer Lawrence.
