30 fashion designers you should know... #09

HUBERT DE GIVENCHY

If his father had had his way, the later master couturier would probably never have designed a single dress. Monsieur Givenchy senior, a government employee, wanted his son to become a lawyer. But luckily, Givenchy was inspired by the elegance of his fashion-concious mother, who studied fashion design. At barely twenty-four years of age (1952) he opened his own salon in Paris. Financially self-reliant from the beginning, Givenchy found the costly couture fabrics for which he would become famous well outside his budget. Lacking funds, he designed his first collection in simple linen, raffia, cotton and woven straw. And he remained faithful to his principle of working only with and never against the material. The result was his trademark: unpretentious elegance, perfectly executed. Givenchy was respected from the outset for his skill, but worldwide fame found him with Audrey Hepburn, whom he met in 1953 on the set of the film Sabrina. Fascinated by her natural grace and unassuming charm, he created a style that underlined her natural beauty with simple, straight lines and high waistlines. Hepburn repid him with lifelong loyalty: both privately and in her films, the actress exclusively wore the creations of her Parisian house couturier. In 1996, eight years after he sold his house to the French luxury goods group LVMH, Hubert de Givenchy bade a final farewell to the world of fashion. In 2006 he put up for auction what was probably his most famous creation: that little black dress in which Audrey Hepburn looked so ravishing in the opening scene of the film Breakfast at Tiffany's. This forty-two-year-old, unadorned sheath dress in heavy Italian satin sold for $807,000 to an unknown bidder, making it to date the most expensive dress in the world.