His clothes were worn by recognized style icons Grace Kelly, Ava Gardner, Audrey Hepburn and Jacqueline Kennedy. Recognized as the “king of fashion, " Balenciaga was one of the few designers who not only created designs, but also sewed and cut, creating not just a dress, but a work of art.
Biography and career.
Cristobal Balenciaga was born in Getaria, a fishing town in the Basque province of Gipuzkoa on January 21, 1895. His mother, after the death of her father, was forced to support the family alone, working as a seamstress. Little Cristobal loved spending time watching her work.
When he was a teenager, a rich family of marquises de Casa Torra settled on the coast of the town. Cristobal visited their villa, playing with the servants' children. The boy gave Marquise advice on style several times, and once created a copy of one of her Drecoll costumes. Since that time, the marquise, confident in the brilliant future of a talented guy, took custody of him. She sent him to study in Madrid, where he learned how to properly design clothes. In 1909, again with her help, he went to Paris, where he studied fashion with the examples of fashion houses Doucet, Worth, Drecoll.
Returning to Spain, in 1919 Balenciaga opened his first boutique in San Sebastian, financed by his patron. His career in Spain was very successful, among his clients were members of the royal family and other aristocrats. Later he opened stores in Madrid and Barcelona. However, with the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War, he moved to France, where in August 1937 he opened the Maison de Couture boutique at Avenue George V.
In 1938, he developed the cut of dresses, which, according to Harper's Bazarr, sat on the figure “like a wet glove on his hand, ” and became the signature style of knitted draped dresses in the 40s. He also refused skirts, the volume of which was created by hoops, giving preference to crinoline and lower skirts.
In 1945, he created a collection of dresses with wide straight shoulders and a narrow waist.
In 1947, his first perfume line “Le Dix” was launched, the name of which displayed the number of the house in which the Balenciaga boutique was located.
However, its full potential was revealed after the war. In 1951, he made a fashionable revolution by changing the traditional silhouette of a woman’s dress, expanding the shoulder line and removing the waist line. In 1955, he designed the tunic dress, and in 1957 the revolutionary Empire clothing line was published, containing copies of high-waisted dresses and a la kimono coats. In the same years, he also developed a style of clothing with high collars, a dress bag and clothes with sleeves three quarters - so that women could decorate their wrists with bracelets.
In 1960, Balenciaga created a wedding dress for Princess Fabiola de Mora Aragon, in which she married the King of Belgium Baudouin. Later, the queen donated this dress to the fund of his name.
Balenciaga also acted as a teacher, giving design design lessons. He became an inspiration for fashion designers such as Oscar de la Renta, Andre Kurrezh, Emanuel Ungaro, Mila Sean and Hubert de Givenchy.
In 1958, Balenciaga was awarded the Legion of Honor.
Balenciaga closed his fashion house in 1968, after 30 years in Paris. One by one, the departments in Paris, Barcelona and Madrid were closed, and the fashion designer announced his desire to go on vacation. He made such a decision after the fashion market seized the finished dress industry of machine processing. The great couturier did not want to give his works, each of which had its own unique style, to impersonal cars. His last public appearance took place at the funeral of Coco Chanel.
Cristobal Balenciaga died on March 23, 1972, in Javea, Spain.
Work style and personal life.
In the 50s, many leading fashion designers, such as Christian Dior, Coco Chanel, Pierre Balmen, created a similar style of clothing. Balenciaga was one of the few who adhered to a different point of view on fashion. He worked with heavy materials, so the dresses he created had almost architectural lines. When Christian Dior created the “new bow” style - with a thin waist and a full skirt, Balenciaga moved in the completely opposite direction, offering her clients straight I-cut dresses, as well as dresses closed at the front with low neck. Thanks to his unique style of work, buyers from all over the world gathered for him to try on.
Balenciaga has always been attentive to the silhouette of the dress being created, approaching each of his creations from the creative side. His fashion house dressed the most elegant women of that time, whether they were royal people or queens of movie screens.
Balenciaga kept his personal life a secret all his life, but it is known that his life partner was a millionaire of French-Russian origin, Vladzio Javorowski d'Atenvale, who also repeatedly supported the couturier financially.
