Shown twice a year in Paris, the couture fashion shows are the biggest draw of the fashion-week calendar. Each exit involves hundreds of hours of painstaking work, nothing is mass-produced, no two outfits (ordered by the 0.001% who shop them) will be the same. These dresses are artworks – each piece is worth in excess of £100,000, to be worn by a single woman, and each design destined to influence what the rest of us will be wearing next season. (Expect to see a corsage revival by Christmas.)
RIVIÉRE Long shawl-collar coat in fluffy grey and ecru tweed with open gathers at the back. OMBRÉ Long dress in embroidered ecru silk jacquard; draped large bow enveloping the shoulders with green and pink organza fringes like wild grasses
CARAVANE Long oversized hand-woven coat composed of stripes of merino wool, boucle merino and alpaca to give a greige and ecru soft fluffy tweed effect
Of the handful of design houses granted membershipby the Fédération de la Haute Couture et de la Mode, Christian Dior is the best known. A gift of a cyclamen posy from former creative director John Galliano gave Jonathan Anderson the starting point for his first foray into couture. Models wore headdresses of silk cyclamen, each one taking 25 hours to make; thousands of silk petals were shaped in a metal mould, with some of these tools centuries-old.
ORCHIDÉE Asymmetrical long dress in double georgette, extended with a scarf panel wrapping the body, blue and silver wild flower embroideries accented with fresh water pearls and faceted beads bias rouleaux stems, rhinestone chains, rhodoid elements and chenille. PANTOMIME Tank top in white silk, sculpted black velvet skirt with abstract white floral motifs taken from a screen print by Magdalene Odundo, asymmetrically draped and held by a boned construction at the hip. ANGUILLE Bar jacket in black wool with satin lapels, velevet peplum embroidered with a cascade of black velvet wisteria, a vegetal cluster of multicoloured shibori organza. Georgette silk embroidered with nasturtiums in threads and shirred black silk chiffon
OMBRÉ Long dress in embroidered ecru silk jacquard; draped large bow enveloping the shoulders with green and pink organza fringes like wild grasses
Anderson’s haute couture debut for Dior last month was created within their 18 specialist ateliers (four times the number of rival houses), and made by a team of 125 white-coated petites mains (literally “small hands”), the highly skilled seamstresses, technicians and artisans who quietly beaver away in organised hubs. They calmly stitch, bead and drape reams of silk georgette into swirls of pleating, crouched over tables for hundreds of hours as a dress, and a fantasy, takes shape.
POISON Black cable-knit sweater worn with a long straight skirt in black wool, protruding at the front in two satin-lined stiff open gathers. FOUGÉRE Rib-knit tank top in black silk, ecru jacquard skirt with cyclamen motif, asymmetrically draped and held by a boned construction at the hip, enhanced with a vegetal cluster of forest green shibori organza
MAGDALENE Long high-neck dress in black silk georgette, hand-pleated and twisted over lightweight ruched tulle structure
Dior Couture in numbers
1.65 meters of fringing on a single bag
730 fresh cyclamen posies sent out to guests
25 hours to make each cyclamen head piece
116 hair and makeup artists
125 petites mains (highly skikked artisans)
200 hours to make each look
23 minutes, running time of the show
BOUDOIR Long dress in black wool gauze with a twisted silk satin belt, with bead, sequin and silk thread-embroidered buttercup yellow and orange wildflower bouquets
Top picture: VERSAILLES Long twisted strapless dress draped around the body, in a blue cyclamen-motif jacquard, tone-on-tone bead, sequin and silk thread embroidery. BONBON Short fan shaped skirt in ecru satin cuir, embroidered with pink silk petals in the form of cyclamen bouquets, inspired by the Cyclone dress from AW1948 collection. Blue cyclamen pattern satin jacquard blouse, held by a long draped scarf collar, with cuffs smocked like embroidery
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