Paul Poiret

In the waning days of the Belle Époque, Paul Poiret (1879 -1944) was known as the “King of Fashion” and “Le Magnifique.” While he was not the only celebrated couturier in Paris at the time, he came to symbolize that era, one that embraced classicism and exoticism, revolutionary change and exquisite workmanship, and the heady exchange between artistic disciplines and the influence of these disciplines (dance, fine art, decorative arts) on fashion. He was also a maverick in that he not only elevated the concept of the fashion designer as artist, but also broadened his creative output to include interior design, perfumes, and, most importantly, the creative marketing of his work.

Poiret was born in Paris to a cloth merchant in the poor neighborhood of Les Halles. After an apprenticeship to umbrella-maker and while still a teenager, Poiret officially became a designer when a dozen of his original sketches was sold to the couturier Madeleine Cheruit. He continued to sell his drawings to other Parisian firms before being hired by the preeminent couturier, Jacques Doucet, in 1896. Poiret noted that his first design, a red cloth cape, sold 400 copies. By 1901, Poiret was employed at the House of Worth, where he was responsible for designing simple, practical dresses called “fried potatoes.” However, the "brazen modernity of his “fried potatoes” proved too much for Worth's conservative clientele. One garment, his Confucius coat with an innovative kimono-like cut, for instance, was described by a Russian princess as “a horror.” Such reactions led Poiret to establish his own maison de couture in 1903.

Over the next decade, until the onset of World War I, Poiret set a new course in modern fashion. He remains best known for his ravishing orientalist evening dresses and fancy ball costumes. These designs echoed the look of contemporaneous Ballet Russes productions, such as Cleopatre and Scherezade, and Poiret’s lampshade tunics and harem pants were among the most celebrated designs of the era. Poiret also crafted a new, freer silhouette that was void of petticoats and corsets. Along with other revolutionaries, he began to drape (rather than tailor) longer, less rigid, classically-inspired column dresses. He also brazenly marketed these designs by producing luxury “albums” of his work illustrated by leading artists such as Paul Iribe (1908) and George Lepape (1911), hosting lavish fêtes, and even staging early versions of fashion shows. His perfume line (Rosine) and his decorative arts company (Martine), each named for one of his daughters, were inspired by the avant-garde Austrian design firm, Wiener Werkstatte.

For all his prescient marketing and design ideas, Poiret was at heart a traditionalist. His love of the lavish and theatrical put him at odds with the ever-changing modernist aesthetic that overtook fashion after World War I. Although he remained in business until 1929, the orientalist predilections he so readily embraced fell out of favor. Nonetheless, Poiret—the couturier, the man, and his legacy—redefined both fashion and the greater world of design.