Sharon Lorenzo does Dior.
Dior Couture, Brooklyn Museum, 2021-2022.
When at the age of fourteen, Christian Dior had his fortune read he was told, “Women will be good to you and it’s thanks to them that you will succeed.” He could not have imagined how true this statement would ring.[1]
It is our good fortune that this massive and glamorous installation has come to Brooklyn after its debut in Paris and travels to London, Shanghai, Denver, and Dallas over a four year cycle. New York Times cultural critic, Zachary Wolffe, noted that it is fun for the Brooklyn Museum to be hosting the “glam behemoth” seventy-five years after Christian Dior launched his own fashion firm in Paris in 1947. [2]
Christian Dior seated in his family garden, Granville, France, 1957.
Christian Dior was born in Granville, France to Madeleine and Alexandre Louis Dior in 1905 as one of five children who relished the gardens and stately residence called “Les Rhumbs” which is translated from French as the points on a compass. Having inherited a family fertilizer business, his father was able to raise his children in the splendor of this mansion amidst rose gardens, lily of the valley, gardenia, and dahlias galore which later played a visual role in the fashion and perfume designs of Christian’s firms.
At the age of 23 he moved to Paris and opened an art gallery with a friend until he was drafted to fight in World War II in 1939. In 1941 he was able to return to civilian life and was hired as a designer by the fashion firm of Lucien Long. By 1946 he was offered the chance to start his own house of fashion with the underwriting of a wealthy friend, Marcel Boussac. The House of Dior opened at 30 Avenue Montaigne in Paris with a staff of 85 persons who premiered his first collection in 1947. One year later he traveled to the United States and met with Stanley Marcus in Dallas who presented him with the Neiman Marcus award for distinguished service in the fashion industry.[3]
Stanley Marcus and Christian Dior, 1947, Award Ceremony, Dallas, Texas. Getty Images.
This exhibition chronicles the evolution of the Dior business as it moved worldwide to encompass both high end couture as well as less expensive ready-to-wear fashion. Sadly, Christian died at the early age of 52 from a heart attack and was succeeded by a 21 year-old employee of the firm, Yves St. Laurent. In addition to his vision for making women of all ages more glamorous, Christian trained a top team in his firm who launched their own houses of design in the years following his death: Marc Bohan, John Galliano, Yves St. Laurent and Maria Grazia Chiuri, the current director of Dior as its first female executive.
Dior Collection 1949, Evelyn Tripp photographed by Erwin Blumenfeld.
Fashion and photography go hand in hand in both the exhibition and ambitious catalog of this show, as we see the infamous photo by Richard Avedon of 1955 where one of the Dior models, Dovima, is framed at the Paris Zoo with two elephants. The quiet elegance of the black and white gown with a train of satin was part of the new look that Christian’s successors tried to capture of quiet elegance. From coast to coast, fashion embraced the rich and famous with Hollywood always part of the glamour group as noted with Marilyn Monroe at the Bel-Air Hotel in 1962.
Dovima with Elephants, Richard Avedon, Museum of Modern Art collection, 1955.
Marilyn Monroe in a backless Dior, Bert Stern, 1962.
The organizing staff team at the Brooklyn Museum also wanted to see if they could insert a few links between their art collection and the Dior originals. A gift in 2018 of the Portrait of Countess Maria Theresia Czernin by Elisabeth Louise Vigee Le Brun from 1793 is juxtaposed with a brilliant red design by Raf Simon who started his fashion career at the house of Dior and now is creative director of the house of Prada in Italy.
Portrait of Countess, M. T. Czernin, 1793, Elisabeth L. Vigee Le Brun, oil on canvas.
Raf Simon, Scarlet Coat, Summer 2018, House of Dior, Ready-to-Wear, USA.
At the same time that the Dior show is featured in Brooklyn, two books have been released that detail the close relationship between Christian Dior and his sister Catherine. Miss Dior, A Story of Courage and Couture by Justine Picardie relates how Catherine’s life intertwined with her brother. While Christian was a fashion magnate, they worked together to launch a line of perfume based on the scents and secrets from their childhood flower garden in Normandy. Christian called his first product, “the fragrance of love”, and named it Miss Dior in honor of Catherine in 1947.
When Christian was drafted into the French army in 1939, Catherine left Paris and moved south near Cannes and worked on a vegetable farm. In the summer of 1944, she was arrested for being part of the French Resistance which smuggled secrets about the movement of Nazi troops within the French borders. She was sent to a detention camp called Ravensbruck, 90 miles north of Berlin, where she was starved and tortured until her release on V.E. day in Paris, May 8, 1945. She then led a quiet life near her original home in Normandy where she cultivated roses to be used in the Dior perfume factories in Grasse, France until her death in 2008.[4] A novel has also been published about the life of Catherine called, Sisters of Resistance, by Christine Wells. The depiction of Nazi crimes and abuse of the French women ranges from rape to frozen ice baths. It is a gripping tale of how the Third Reich preyed on the French nation during their years running the government under Pierre Laval and Philippe Petain from 1942-1944.[5]
Catherine Dior, 1917-2008.
Miss Dior Perfume, launched 1947 by House of Dior, Paris, France.
Dior Couture Galleries, Brooklyn Museum, 2021-2022.
In conclusion, the galleries of haute couture at the Brooklyn Museum will surpass your expectations with glamourous clothes and brilliant backdrops that will make normal shopping seem very sleepy by comparison. The best of kind has come forward to salute the amazing contributions of the Dior family past and present, and we are deeply grateful for their vision in the early part of the 20th century when the world was emerging from a traumatizing war experience on many fronts.
Timed tickets are recommended for visiting this spectacular show as it is busy with tourists from all over the globe. Dior perfumes and lipsticks are available for all in the museum gift shops this holiday season.
Brooklyn Museum, 200 Eastern Parkway, Brooklyn, New York 11238
Sept.10, 2021-Feb. 20, 2022
[1] Yokobosky,Matthew. The Flower Women: Dior Through the Lens of American Photographers. Christian Dior: Designer of Dreams, Brooklyn Museum, 2021, pp. 189.
[2] Wolffe, Zachary. Christian Dior : Designer of Dreams, The New York Times, Sept. 15, 2021.
[3] Footer, Maureen. A New Fashion Diplomacy. Christian Dior: Designer of Dreams, Brooklyn Museum, p. 61.
[4] Picardie, Justine. Miss Dior, A Story of Courage and Couture. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2021, p. 2.
[5] Wells, Christine. Sisters of Resistance, William Morrow Publishers, 2021.
