In 1917 Cristóbal Balenciaga opened a boutique in San Sebastian, Spain. Hailed as one of the most important "haute couture" creators in fashion history, the designer sewed his first dress for the Queen of Spain at the age of 21. It's a great success in the life of the son of a dressmaker and a fisherman.
They lived in the small village of Getaria in the Basque Country. His father used to go out hunting, his mother worked as a tailor. Cristóbal watched her work with interest from an early age. He quickly had to learn the trade and after his father's death he helped support the family by apprenticing in a tailor's shop.
He was in his late teens when he was spotted there by the Marquise Casa Torres, who took charge of his training in this direction. In 1917 he began to open his first boutiques: in San Sebastian, Madrid and Barcelona. The Civil War ruined his business plans, so he decided to move to France. This is where the Polish theme comes in: together with his life partner Wladz Jaworowski d'Attainville, an aristocrat with Polish-French roots, and business partner Nicolás Bizcarrond, he opened his fashion house at 10 Avenue George V in Paris. His collection was an incredible success and received acclaim from customers and the press.
As in a cocoon
In the 1940s popular perfumes "Le Dix" and "La Fuite des Heures" were released under the Balenciaga label. In 1948 Vladzio died, which broke Cristóbal down. He wanted to close the company and abandon fashion. However, this did not happen. In 1951 he created the Cocoon (French for cocoon) collection and from then on he designed oversized coats, tunics, skimmer jackets or bomber skirts, which were innovative for the time. The 1950s and 1960s were the height of his fame. He invented baggy dresses, parachute dresses and baby doll dresses. He played with form and didn't care about asymmetry. When others emphasised the feminine silhouette, he preferred to sketch geometry. The brand's contemporary creative director Demna still draws inspiration from those forms today.
Cristóbal Balenciaga has taken the royal courts by storm. He designed the wedding dress of Queen Fabiola de Mory of Belgium, dressed the Spanish monarch Victoria Eugenia, the Duchess of Windsor and the Princess of Monaco. He famously retired after thirty years of running a fashion empire. He died in 1972 in the town of Javea, Spain.
A new chapter
The pages of the Balenciaga fashion house's history began to fill anew, when Nicolas Ghesquière came to lead its creative team and breathed new life into it. Like the brand's legendary founder, Nicolas was fascinated by tailoring from an early age, creating his first designs as a 14-year-old! His collections were avant-garde, futuristic, with great influences from science-fiction films, which he was very impressed by. His style was quickly loved by celebrities like Charlotte Gainsbourg and Kate Moss. In 2001 the brand joined the luxury goods conglomerate Kering. A boutique was opened in New York and work began on the men's line.
In 2012 American designer Alexander Wang became creative director. He held the position for three years until he was replaced by Demna.
Dolce & Gabbana Kids
Demna was born in Georgia in 1981 to a Georgian father and a Russian mother. In 2001, after graduating, he moved with his parents to Dusseldorf, Germany, and then to Antwerp, Belgium, where he enrolled at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts and completed a master's degree in fashion design.
In 2014 Demna launched his own label, VETEMENTS, and in October of the same year presented his first women's ready-to-wear collection in Paris. In March 2016 he hosted his first Balenciaga Women autumn-winter fashion show. This collection referred strongly to the work of Cristóbal Balenciaga, but retained the character of Demna.
In June 2016 Balenciaga House presented its first men's runway show of the spring-summer 2017 collection and Demna's debut menswear line. In January 2020 the relaunch of "haute couture" was announced, bringing Balenciaga back to "its origins" and creating "an undiscovered mode of creative freedom and a platform for innovation" that is still explored today.
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