Avant-garde fashion, futuristic design: French fashion designer Pierre Cardin has been a fashion visionary for 70 year and is a last-surviving legend of haute couture's golden age.
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Avant-garde fashion, futuristic design: Pierre Cardin
Avant-garde and futuristic design: French fashion designer Pierre Cardin has been a fashion visionary for over 70 years and will be remembered as a legend of haute couture.
Image: picture alliance/AP Photo/C. Ena
Successful entreprenuer
Born to French parents on July 2, 1922 in a town near Venice, Pierre Cardin was a teen when he started in dressmaking and quickly embraced the idea of "bella figura." In men’s fashion in particular, Cardin designs have a sculpture-like silhouette. The owner of 800 factories worldwide, a castle, a museum and half a village, Cardin was one of the richest men in France.
Image: picture alliance/dpa/Y. Valat
Retro design
In the 1960s, Pierre Cardin dressed his models in shiny patent leather, plastic, and tight, shimmering metallic bodysuits - all of which are totally hip at the moment, too. Cardin presented the above collection at the 2012 Barcelona Fashion Week. Cardin fashion is available worldwide in dozens of franchise and privately-owned retail stores.
Image: picture alliance/dpa/A. Garcia
Futuristic vision
Cardin always tended toward Italian futurism. Painters and sculptors, architects and designers had a significant influence on his abstract fashion designs. Cardin’s ideas were often breathtaking - but not really suitable for everyday use. Few men would actually go shopping in a "Made by Cardin" outfit like the above.
Image: picture alliance/dpa/L. Dolega
Couture for men
Cardin revolutionized fashion: each new collection was different, was more innovative. His creativity appeared to be boundless. He was the first fashion czar to sell affordable haute couture off the rack. The famous Galeries Lafayette department store carried his collections, including the above menswear for the fall/winter season 1983/84.
Image: picture alliance/dpa/AFP
Quality matters
Fastidious, Pierre Cardin made sure his fashion was cut from the best material. Fabric was made to his specifications. He was usually ahead of his terms in his choice of colors and texture. Cardin set new textile trends, and other couturiers often followed his lead. Above, the designer inspects exquisite tweed wool fabric.
Image: picture alliance/dpa/UPI
Icing on the cake
The designer is involved in every minute detail before the models saunter onto the catwalk to present his latest fashion. Above, he tweaked a hairdo here and a hat there for a show presenting avant-garde fashion in Rome in 1960.
Famous fashion designers like to be surrounded by rich, beautiful women. Or better still, celebrities, queens, film stars and female aristocrats. As a businessman, Pierre Cardin was fully aware of the promotional effect that stars like "Bond-Girl" Ursula Andress had when wearing his designs in the glitzy world of Hollywood.
Image: picture alliance/IMAGNO/Votava
The Cardin brand
The fashion house that Pierre Cardin founded in 1950 has become both a temple of haute couture and a vast business empire. Cardin has sold more than 600 licenses to produce clothes under his brand name. This discreet leather patch adorns the backside of Pierre Cardin men’s jeans all over the world.
Image: picture alliance/dpa/R. Fellens
Space Odyssey
Always good for a spectacular surprise, Cardin let male and female models show his 2008 spring/summer collection striding down a catwalk across a desert landscape in northwestern China. A year later, he sold licenses to China to sell coveted Cardin fashion and accessories.
Image: AFP/Getty Images/P. Parks
True extravagance
2016 saw the last Cardin fashion show to date. This time, however, it was presented in classic catwalk style in Paris, the fashion capital and the center of Cardin’s business empire since 1944. As always, the colors and styles were modern and distinctive. The nonagenarian still spends hours every day sketching draft designs.
Image: picture alliance / AP Photo/C. Ena
Crafty genius
His fashion and the Cardin empire have made the Italian-born designer not only rich, but also a legend among old-school fashion designers like Christian Dior, Coco Chanel and Yves Saint Laurent. Pierre Cardin was a match for them all.
Image: picture alliance/dpa/G. Horcajuelo
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As an aspiring young fashion designer, Pierre Cardin first worked for Christian Dior before starting his own company in 1950.
Today, the Italian-born French fashion designer is one of the world's most influential and prosperous fashion designers.
His iconic 1954 "bubble dress" was a huge international success, as was a clothing line for kids launched in 1966.
Cardin is best known, however, for his avant-garde geometric styles in haute couture. He has also licensed various endless ready-to-wear products that carry his name.
Click on the picture gallery to explore the life of the timeless French fashion icon.