Cardin’s pioneering approach to design and business is widely credited with reshaping the landscape of the fashion industry.
Pierre Cardin, the Groundbreaking French Fashion Designer, Has Died at 98
Pierre Cardin, the prolific avant-garde French designer best known for his geometric, space-age couture and his maverick approach to business that would reshape the French fashion industry, died earlier today in a hospital in Neuilly in the west of Paris, his family confirmed to the Agence France-Presse. “It is a day of great sadness for all our family. Pierre Cardin is no more,” they said in a statement. “We are all proud of his tenacious ambition and the daring he has shown throughout his life.” He was 98 years old.
“I don’t like to stop, I like to continually prove myself,” Cardin said in an interview with CBS back in 2012, a sentiment that his tireless work ethic all the way up until his death pays testament to. Renowned throughout his career for his groundbreaking approach to both design and business, Cardin expanded his empire through licensing of everything from automobiles to restaurants (he turned Maxim’s, the historic Parisian Belle Époque restaurant, into a global brand), to hotels, jewelry, glasses, fragrances, furniture, and even tableware. Though the practice of a fashion house lending its name to a variety of different products and concepts is now commonplace, Cardin’s approach was pioneering. So too did Cardin revolutionize the business model of a high fashion brand by introducing the concept of ready-to-wear in 1959, a reflection of his firmly-held belief that quality design should be accessible to all.
Born Pietro Cardin in Treviso, Italy, in 1922, his French parents escaped Italy’s fascist regime when Cardin was two years old, settling in St. Etienne, a coal-mining town in eastern central France. In spite of his wine merchant father’s desire that he should pursue architecture, from childhood, Cardin knew he was interested in fashion. He took his first apprenticeship as early as 14, before moving to Vichy in 1944, where he trained as a tailor.
Soon after completing his apprenticeship, Cardin moved to Paris, where he worked with the most famous couture houses of the time—Paquin and Schiaparelli—and decorative artist Christian Bérard to design costumes and masks for Jean Cocteau’s ballet La Belle et la Bête. By 1947, Cardin had become Christian Dior’s tailleur during the revolutionary New Look era. It was expected that Cardin would succeed Dior, but in 1950, Cardin left to set up his own firm on 10 rue Richepanse.
This story originally appeared on: Vogue - Author:Tara Joshi
