Sleeveless blue knee-length dress; blue sequins fringe strips

Molyneux

1891 - 1974

BiographyRegarded as “the gentleman of couture,” British couturier Edward Molyneux produced garments of elegant simplicity and refinement. In his memoir, Pierre Balmian called Molyneux’s couture salon a “temple of subdued elegance.” Indeed, Molyneux brought a sense of British propriety and sophistication to the word of Paris fashion. During the 1920s and 1930s, Molyneux socialized with the aristocracy and the café society of Paris, where he gained invaluable insight into the lifestyles of the women he dressed. His designs attracted admirers in England and the United States, as well, including leaders of high society, such as Wallis Simpson, Elsa Maxwell and Lady Diana Cooper.

Born in 1891, Molyneux’s first aspiration was to be a painter. While in art school, his sketch for an evening dress won a competition sponsored by the couturier Lucille, who subsequently hired him. With the outbreak of the First World War, Molyneux enlisted in the British army and eventually became a Captain—a title he would retain for the rest of his life. After the war, he returned to Paris and in 1919 opened his own couture salon. He later opened branches in Monte Carlo, Cannes, Biarritz, and London. Molyneux’s maison de couture quickly became the place where “the world’s best –dressed women wore the inimitable two-pieces, and tailored suits with pleated skirts, bearing the label Molyneux,” recalled former employee Pierre Balmain.

Molyneux’s style fully emerged in the 1930s and was characterized by a distinctive simplicity. His designs were in keeping with the modernist style characteristic of the period, as he preferred a streamlined, uncluttered silhouette. Known for his evening pajamas, easy-to-wear slip-like dresses, and tailored day suits in coordinating fabrics, Molyneux avoided excessive decoration. Even his sequined evening dresses were tempered. His color palette, too, was Spartan, as he preferred to work mostly in black, grey, navy blue, brown and beige.

While Molyneux is primarily remembered for his fashions of the 1920s and 1930s, his career spanned more than fifty years. He influenced a generation of designers, including Pierre Balmain and Christian Dior, whom he once humbly praised: “[Dior] knows also how to make a Molyneux, but I am not capable of making a Dior.”

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