October, 6th, 2017

#HERVELEGER
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ACTE PREMIER
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One assistant @Fendi years ago found himself rebaptisé when @KarlLagerfeld deemed his actual surname, #Peugnet, cumbersome and provincial. “I said, ‘Hervé, this name is not possible, it’s too heavy”. The assistant eventually left to found his own line, and the world came to know him, as Mr. #Lagerfeld did, as Hervé Léger, from the French word for “light.” While at #Fendi, he learned how to construct fur coats in felt b ands, thus an early experiment with a striped silhouette. When Lagerfeld moved to #Chanel in 1983, Léger followed and for two years was his assistant on the couture and ready- to-wear collections. Léger then designed couture for #Cadette in #Milan and worked as an assistant for @DVF. In 1984, he opened his first boutique on Rue de Pélican in Paris, selling dresses and hats. While starting up his own line, he continued to freelance and produced a fur collection for #Chloe in 1987 as well as couture at #Lanvin, accessories for Daniel #Swarovski, and ready- to wear clothing for #CharlesJourdan. In 1989, Léger’s signature body-molding dress evolved from his discovery of discarded stretch viscose b ands, meant for foundation garments, in the garbage bin at a clothing fac tory. For the finale of his show at the Angelina Tea Salon in Paris in the early 1990s, Léger sent out a sleek V-neck dress sculpted from these b ands. By 1992 the so-called b andage dresses were selling successfully @Berg dorfs, @NeimanMarcus, and @GaleriesLafayette and were popular with high-profile clients. Each dress was h and-stitched and took between sixteen hours and a week to complete with his magic fingers weaving b ands of fabric across busts and butts for curvacious, body-sculpting confections designed to look like they were tightly wound around the body accentuating a woman’s curves in the most flattering of ways. Dubbed the “b andeau dress”, it’s unclear whether Leger initiated the trend or whether it was his contemporary, @AzzedineAlaiaofficial, who did so during the same period. #Alaia honed his skills lively on the bodies of the déesses danseuses of posh cabaret Crazy Horse.
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#ALESSANDROBERGA | L’ÉDITOR
#PARIS #PFW #MODEDIPLOMATIQUE