Pierre Cardin

For the Canadian politician, see Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin.

Pierre Cardin
Cardin in 1978
Born	Pietro Costante Cardin (1922-07-02)2 July 1922 San Biagio di Callalta, Italy
Died	29 December 2020(2020-12-29) (aged 98) Neuilly-sur-Seine, France
Citizenship	Italy France (after 1924)
Occupation	Grand couturier
Years active	1945−2011
Awards	Grand Officer of the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic Commander of the Legion of Honour Commander of the National Order of Merit Knight of the Order of Arts and Letters
Signature

Pierre Cardin (UK: /ˈkɑːrdæ̃, -dæn/, US: /kɑːrˈdæ̃, -ˈdæn/, French: [pjɛʁ kaʁdɛ̃]), born Pietro Costante Cardin (2 July 1922 – 29 December 2020), was an Italian-born naturalised-French fashion designer. He is known for what were his avant-garde style and Space Age designs. He preferred geometric shapes and motifs, often ignoring the female form. He advanced into unisex fashions, sometimes experimental, and not always practical. He founded his fashion house in 1950 and introduced the "bubble dress" in 1954.

Though he is remembered today mostly for his Space Age late '60s womenswear, during the 1960s and first half of the '70s he was better known as the top menswear designer of the time, the man who had reintroduced shaped, fitted suits to the public after a long period of looser fit in men's clothes. Retailers noted that Cardin's popularity had taught men to associate a designer's name with their clothing the way women had long done. Cardin was often said to have been the main non-British leader of the Peacock Revolution that had begun in the UK. His menswear collection from the year 1960 was so influential that the Beatles' tailor Dougie Millings copied its collarless suits for the group in 1963.

Cardin was designated a UNESCO Goodwill Ambassador in 1991, and a United Nations FAO Goodwill Ambassador in 2009.

Career

Cardin was born near Treviso in northern Italy, the son of Maria Montagner and Alessandro Cardin. His parents were wealthy wine merchants, but lost their fortune in World War I. To escape the blackshirts they left Italy and settled in Saint-Étienne, France in 1924 along with his ten siblings. His father wanted him to study architecture, but from childhood he was interested in dressmaking and at age fourteen apprenticed with Saint-Étienne tailor Louis Bompuis.

Cardin moved to Paris in 1945 after World War II. There, he studied architecture, briefly pursued an acting career, and met Jean Cocteau, who employed him to do costumes for his 1946 film Beauty and the Beast/La Belle et la Bête. He worked with the fashion house of Paquin, then Elsa Schiaparelli, until he became head of Christian Dior's tailleure atelier in 1947, but was denied work at Balenciaga. While at Dior, he contributed the popular Bar suit to Dior's inaugural 1947 "Corolle" collection, already displaying the deft tailoring that he would be known for in later years.

1950s

Cardin founded his own fashion house in 1950. His early designs fit well into the fashion world of the time, especially his suits, which quickly attracted notice in Paris. His career was launched when he designed about 30 of the costumes for a masquerade ball in Venice, hosted by Carlos de Beistegui in 1951. The same year, Andre Oliver joined Cardin as an assistant, eventually becoming Artistic Director. Cardin inaugurated his haute couture output in 1953 with his first collection of women's clothing and became a member of the Chambre Syndicale, a French association of haute couture designers. The following year he opened his first boutique, Eve, and introduced the "bubble dress", which is a short-skirted, bubble-shaped dress made by bias-cutting over a stiffened base.

For spring of 1957, he presented a more extensive couture collection than he had before and it brought him widespread international attention for the first time. The collection focused on two dress silhouettes, a long, lean, unwaisted chemise dress and one that featured what he called a "Navette" line, a high waist with fullness over the hips tapering down to a drawn-in knee. A navette is a weaving shuttle, so the skirts were vaguely spindle-shaped. Observers compared the skirt shape to an egg standing on its narrow end or to an amphora. Skirts of similar form were a rising trend among designers in France, Italy, and Spain. The Navette line also extended to coats. His tailoring ability was expressed in three different suit styles, all high-waisted. In February of that year, just after the collection debuted, Christian Dior suggested publicly that Cardin could easily become French couture's leading light, and after Dior's death that October, the fashion press considered Cardin to be one of three young designers who might rise to a position equivalent to Dior's.

Also in 1957, he opened his Adam boutique for men. By that time, alone among Paris couturiers, he had already established a name for himself in menswear, particularly for a line of small, squared-off bowties in unusual fabrics. His entry into the field paralleled the beginnings of a renaissance in creative menswear occurring in the UK, which would inspire Cardin during the following decade.

Cardin was the first couturier to turn to Japan as a high fashion market when he travelled there in 1957, and it was in Japan that he would discover one of his favorite models and muses, Hiroko Matsumoto, known professionally as Hiroko, whom the public would associate with Cardin through much of the 1960s.

After his breakthrough 1957 couture collections, Cardin's womenswear shows would be regularly covered in the world's fashion press. He continued to be recognized as a top tailor, and his late 1950s collections were noted for their accomplished presentations of a number of trends of the time: waistless dresses, geometric seaming, large collars, large buttons, shoulder interest, knee-length skirts, large tall hats, and bouffant hairstyles. These styles were accepted in Europe but considered avant-garde in the US, where Cardin was grouped with similar designers like Givenchy. Americans preferred the kind of figure-revealing forms established by Dior in 1947 and rejected the new shapes out of Europe.

Cardin also began to display at this time design elements that would become characteristic of his work for years to come. His love of pleats, cowl necklines, and batwing sleeves, for instance, already evident in the late fifties, would still be notable in his output in the 1980s. Large, upturned bowl hats set on the back of the head were also favored by him in these years and would continue to be seen in his collections into the mid-1960s.

In 1958, he showed knee-length puffball skirts, coats with similar turned-under hems, and bouffant wig hats consisting of silk flowers for the spring, and, for the fall, large, innovative collar treatments, high waists, bouffant millinery, and slim, somewhat Directoire eveningwear, all contributing to what he called a mushroom silhouette. His 1959 work focused on a lowered and extended shoulderline achieved via tucked sleeves; continued collar interest; dresses that were either chemises or softly bloused about a belted waist; puff-hemmed balloon skirts for evening somewhat similar to Balenciaga's of 1950; and continued large hats and bouffant hairdos.

He also presented his first women's ready-to-wear collection in 1959.

1960s

In early 1960, Cardin showed a full menswear line for the first time. This 1960 menswear collection attracted international attention with its narrow silhouette (called by some a "cigarette" shape), natural shoulders, center-vented suit jackets, foulard shirts, prominent belts, and, above all, collarless suits, famously copied by the Beatles' tailor three years later.

Cardin's women's collections in the early 1960s often concentrated on more flowing lines than previously, lines that were sometimes said to be influenced by the 1930s. To his favorite pleats, batwing sleeves, cowl necklines, and bowl hats he added side closures, open backs, deep decolletage, capelet collars, scarf tops, floating panels, bias cuts, and extensive chiffon. In the earliest sixties, he showed close-fitting, helmet-like cloche hats that looked like they were straight out of the late 1920s or early 1930s. In 1961, he showed sou'wester hats with almost no front rim and a back rim so exaggerated it resembled a bill. His hems stayed mostly at the knee for daywear but were lengthened by several inches for fall of 1962, giving an even more thirties-like appearance. This fluid thirties-ish look would extend into 1965 with handkerchief hems and scalloped skirts.

Though Cardin's womenswear hadn't reached the Dior levels of prestige predicted for him in the late fifties, his work remained well received in Europe. In the US, however, his women's clothes were still considered overly avant-garde and sales remained low.

Possible first signs of Space Age influence appeared in fall of 1963, when Cardin joined other designers in showing a more youthful silhouette consisting at base of hip-length blouson-like tops/jackets over narrow skirts hitting at the top of the knee worn with muffled collars, helmet-like or hood-like hats and caps, flat boots, and tights, with Saint Laurent and a few others showing the first women's thigh boots. Cardin's boots reached the knee. It was in this collection that he would first present the geometric cutouts that would become widespread by 1966. Cardin's 1963 cutouts were applied to tunics worn over slim dresses.

In 1964, he showed low-slung waists and tights that matched upper garments, including patterned tights matching patterned tops, a characteristic trend of the mid-sixties, and he began adding simple, top-of-the-knee A-line shift dresses emblazoned with large geometric shapes such as targets, as Paris picked up on London's Mod boutique culture of the early 1960s.

Perhaps surprisingly for a designer considered avant-garde, Cardin resisted and even denounced pants for women as they rose in popularity in the mid-sixties after André Courrèges promoted them for everyday wear in 1964, a stance Cardin would maintain until 1968.

Cardin launched a men's ready-to-wear line in 1964 that included numerous turtlenecks, a garment that would become a mainstay of men's fashion during the decade. By 1965, his men's suits had evolved into a more shaped, fitted style, usually three-piece, sometimes double-breasted, featuring longer jackets with marked waists, deeper vents, and wider lapels on both jackets and vests; and slim pants with a slight flare below the knee. Ties were wider. Shirts were colored or striped and had more prominent collars. Footwear was often an ankle-high boot style that came to be associated with Cardin, designed to maintain a clean line while concealing the socks. This silhouette was inspired by the Mod menswear trends of the UK.

By 1966, Cardin favored an even closer fit for his menswear; slightly wider, more squared shoulders on longer jackets; two-piece or three-piece suits, the vests now sans lapels; a single inverted pleat for jackets instead of vents; higher shirt collars; larger tie knots on even wider ties; and flared pants. Turtlenecks were now presented even for evening, a trend that would become characteristic of the second half of the decade. More casual clothes were also slim, even tight, and featured turtlenecks, jackets with zippers closing fronts and pockets, trousers with stripes along the outer seam, and prominent belts, with summer clothes more colorful and including striped shirts worn open enough to expose the chest and flared pants with colorful side stripes. All of this became very influential and popular, including in the US.

Cardin resigned from the Chambre Syndicale in 1966 and began showing his collections in his own venue. He also designed uniforms for Pakistan International Airlines, which were introduced from 1966 to 1971 and became an instant hit.

Cardin had entered his Space Age phase by 1966, as had much of the rest of the fashion world following André Courrèges's landmark 1964 and '65 collections and the widespread influence of Britain's Mod culture. His menswear collections now also included a Cosmonaut or Cosmocorps line characterized by stretch-fit jumpsuits, hip-belted tunics, and tights-like or flared trousers, all with prominent, often ring-pulled zippers and ultra-modern boots that sometimes rose to the knee.

His Space Age-period womenswear featured mini lengths, extensive cutouts, large geometric figures on simple shift dresses, geometric necklines, and cutaway shoulders. He was the leading advocate of cutouts and prominent zippers as those details peaked among designers in 1966. His cutouts included bare midriffs overlain with geometric shapes. Colors were vivid and graphic. Shoes were flat and square-toed in the dominant style of the time. That year, he showed tights and shoes that matched his miniskirts, often having them all exactly the same color, a combination he felt made mini lengths more wearable for women of various ages. He favored geometric diamond shapes, jackets that fell to a low triangular peak at the bottom of the front closure, T-bar cutout necklines, metal neck rings anchoring shift dresses, and the large-scale targets, circles, and triangles that were popular at the time across simple A-line shift minidresses. He made his penchant for scalloped edges fit the new geometric mode by making it prominent and oversized on the hem or the leading edge of asymmetric jacket closures that often fastened on the far side, as Cardin had long preferred, but now were closed with tabs. Fabrics were often the substantial double-faced ones of the period also favored by Courrèges. In 1966, he became one of the first designers to include purses in a couture show, his made by Gucci.

It was during this period that he began to be known for capes and ponchos, having shown capelet collars for a long time. These he made look futuristic via geometric circular or square armholes and precisely curvilinear arches cut into the sides for the arms. Cape and poncho sleeves were also shown. He adapted his love of asymmetric hems, earlier a part of his 1930s look, to the new Space Age period by showing hemlines that were shorter on one side than the other, sometimes called a tilted hem, seen especially on evening dresses; miniskirts longer in the front than in the back; skirts consisting of strips, panels, and loops of fabric of various lengths and widths, some petal-like; pleated skirts with fluted hems that curled up and down; and other unusual forms. These trends became particularly notable beginning in 1967.

Interest in Space Age looks would peak in mainstream fashion during 1966 and part of 1967 and then most designers would move into other areas. Cardin was one of a small group of designers who remained enamored of futuristic Space Age looks for several more years. The best known of these were André Courrèges, Rudi Gernreich, Emanuel Ungaro, and Paco Rabanne, all of whom tied their ideas of the future to mini lengths. Cardin's work was noted for including a variety of lengths from 1967 on, particularly his characteristic asymmetric hems, while keeping it all futuristic-looking.

His 1967 women's collections continued with zippers, pleating, side closures, scallops, one-shouldered evening dresses, geometric necklines, sculptural metal collars, and other familiar Cardin features and added rolled hems and edges, jumper minidresses, diagonal closures, a greater variety of geometric pockets, and metal or metal-looking plastic used for tab closures, wide metal belts, ring collars, and hem bands. For fall, he included deeply flaring, Medieval-looking sleeves. frog closings, large collars that framed the head from the back, complexly gored skirts, front lacing on jackets and coats, coats with big, colored circles on them with matching deep hems of fox dyed to match the circles, capes completely sunburst-pleated, and more black than usual. Many of his silhouettes were in the flared trapeze/A-line/conical shapes widespread at the time.

His Space Age womenswear during these few years was in line with the mood of the design world and became very influential, even in the US, where new Cardin women's boutiques opened in prominent department stores. By 1967, some of his adult styles for both men and women were also offered in juniors' and children's sizes.

HIs menswear from the last three years of the decade enjoyed a mass audience, still outselling his womenswear by a large margin. He continued with his shaped, fitted, wide-lapelled, wide-tied, flared-leg suits, plus lots of zippers and turtlenecks for more casual clothes. His Cosmonaut outfits grew in popularity, consisting of fitted, belted, often sleeveless tunics over slim, often flared trousers in various fabrics, paired with turtlenecks and boots.

Pierre Cardin dress, made from heat-moulded Dynel, 1968

Cardin continued with his futuristic womenswear in 1968, showing synthetic outfits of molded Cardine fabric whose surfaces stood out in geometric forms, metallic silver leather, phosphorescent fabrics (also shown by Paco Rabanne), light-up electric dresses (also shown by Diana Dew), increased use of metal, and extensive use of cutouts, sometimes directly over each breast. He used vinyl and other forms of plastic liberally. He and fellow futurist André Courrèges favored a basic, versatile dress scheme of ribknit bodystocking or turtleneck and tights under various forms of jumper minidresses or microminiskirts. Cardin also showed the thigh- or hip-high leather or vinyl stretch boots that were popular with designers at the end of the sixties, Cardin's often in shiny black and paired with his Space Age-looking geometric minidresses and turtlenecks.

He finally showed women's trousers in 1968, initially as part of his unisex clothes, an important trend of this enlightened era. He produced identical tunics, turtlenecks, flared trousers, hip belts, and boots for both sexes, and also made ribknit jumpsuits/bodystockings and ribknit trousers for women that extended into a thickened flare over the top of the foot.

Also in 1968, Cardin opened a furniture and interior decor store called Environnement.

In 1969, his futuristic looks were augmented by Space Age belt fastenings covered by transparent plastic domes; leather added to his continued use of vinyl; newly trapunto-stitched versions of his face-framing collars; additional trapunto detailing; and plush ring-hoods. He also continued with his more flowing, diaphanous looks like asymmetric hems, floating panels, and ponchos and capes, now making ponchos into skirts and dresses and adding shawls and shawl-like jackets. The increased popularity of maxiskirts was reflected among Cardin's variety of skirt lengths, their positive reception seen by Cardin as arising from people now being accustomed to covered legs because of so many women wearing trousers. He continued to include miniskirts among his other lengths. His long love of pleats was seen in both his futuristic styles and his more flowing garments, and his love of decolletage and Directoire lines was taken to extremes in his eveningwear of the end of the decade.

Cardin's attitude toward fashion showings varied. In the mid-sixties, he added two additional private client showings to his normal biannual couture shows, but he also disliked being expected to have so many shows per year and by the end of the decade would be known for fewer shows but with many more outfits presented than other designers, into the hundreds of pieces, resulting in very long fashion shows in which models walked very fast to save time, a tendency that would continue into the seventies.

Cardin did costumes for several films during the 1960s, mostly those starring close friend Jeanne Moreau, films like Joseph Losey's Eva (1962), Marcel Ophüls's Banana Peel (1963), Jean-Louis Richard's Mata Hari, Agent H21 (1964), Anthony Asquith's The Yellow Rolls-Royce (1964), Louis Malle's Viva Maria! (1965), and François Truffaut's The Bride Wore Black (1968), as well as Anthony Asquith's The V.I.P.s (1963) and Anthony Mann's A Dandy in Aspic (1968). For François Truffaut's influential 1962 film Jules et Jim, star Jeanne Moreau wore several Cardin pieces that were from her own wardrobe.

1970s

As haute couture began to decline, ready-to-wear ('prêt-à-porter') soared as well as Cardin's designs. He was the first to combine the "mini" and the "maxi" skirts of the 1970s by introducing a new hemline that had long pom-pom panels or fringes.

Beginning in the 1970s, Cardin set another new trend: "mod chic". This trend holds true for the form or for a combination of forms, which did not exist at the time. He was the first to combine extremely short and ankle-length pieces. He made dresses with slits and batwing sleeves with novel dimensions and mixed circular movement and gypsy skirts with structured tops. These creations allowed for the geometric shapes that captivated him to be contrasted, with both circular and straight lines. Cardin became an icon for starting this popular fashion movement of the early 1970s.

Inspired by space travel and exploration, Cardin visited NASA (the National Aeronautics and Space Administration) in 1970, where he tried on the original spacesuit worn by the first human to set foot on the Moon, Neil Armstrong. Cardin designed spacesuits for NASA in 1970.

Pierre Cardin and the French composer Régis Campo, from Académie des beaux-arts, Institut de France, Paris, 2017

Cardin resigned from the Chambre Syndicale in 1966 and began showing his collections in his own venue. He also designed uniforms for Pakistan International Airlines, which were introduced from 1966 to 1971 and became an instant hit.

In 1971, Cardin redesigned the barong tagalog, a national costume of the Philippines, by opening the front, removing the cuffs that needed cufflinks, flaring the sleeves, and minimizing the embroidery. It was also tapered to the body, in contrast with the traditional loose-fitting design, and it also had a thicker collar with sharp and pointed cuffs. A straight-cut design was favored by President Ferdinand Marcos.

In 1975, Cardin opened his first furniture boutique on the Rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré. In 1977, 1979, and 1983, he was awarded the Cartier Golden Thimble by French haute couture for the most creative collection of the season. He was a member of the Chambre Syndicale de la Haute Couture et du Prêt-à-Porter from 1953 to 1993.

Cardin's first American-made, mass produced home furnishing collection came in 1977 when Cardin partnered with Dillingham Manufacturing Company, Scandinavian Folklore Carpets of Denmark for Ege Rya Inc., and the Laurel Lamp Company.

In 1979, Cardin was appointed a consultant to China's agency for trade in textiles, and in March of that year, he became the first Western designer to present a fashion show in China in many decades.

1980s and later

In 1981, Cardin acquired Maxim's. He introduced Maxim's to Beijing in 1983, where it was among the first international brands to operate in mainland China and became an enduring cultural landmark.

Like many other designers today, Cardin decided in 1994 to show his collection only to a small circle of selected clients and journalists. After a break of 15 years, he showed a new collection to a group of 150 journalists at his bubble home in Cannes.

A biography titled Pierre Cardin, his fabulous destiny was written by Sylvana Lorenz.

A documentary on Cardin's life and career, House of Cardin directed by P. David Ebersole and Todd Hughes premiered to a standing ovation on 6 September 2019 at the 76th Venice International Film Festival in the Giornate degli Autori section, with Mr. Cardin in attendance.

Eponymous brand

Main article: Pierre Cardin (brand)

Pierre Cardin used his name as a brand, initially a prestigious fashion brand, then in the 1960s extended successfully into perfumes and cosmetics. From about 1988 the brand was licensed extensively, and appeared on "wildly nonadjacent products such as baseball caps and cigarettes".

Pierre Cardin-branded pen

A 2005 article in the Harvard Business Review commented that the extension into perfumes and cosmetics was successful as the premium nature of the Pierre Cardin brand transferred well into these new, adjacent categories, but that the owners of the brand mistakenly attributed this to the brand's strength rather than to its fit with the new product categories. The extensive licensing eroded the high-end perception of the brand, but was lucrative; in 1986 Women's Wear Daily (WWD) estimated Cardin's annual income at over US$10 million.

In 1995, quotes from WWD included "Pierre Cardin—he has sold his name for toilet paper. At what point do you lose your identity?" and "Cardin's cachet crashed when his name appeared on everything from key chains to pencil holders". However, the Cardin name was still very profitable, although the indiscriminate licensing approach was considered a failure.

In 2011, Cardin tried to sell his business, valuing it at €1 billion, although the Wall Street Journal considered it to be worth about a fifth of that amount. Ultimately he did not sell the brand.

Automobiles

Cardin interior in a 1972 AMC Javelin

Cardin entered industrial design by developing thirteen basic design "themes" that would be applied to various products, each consistently recognizable and carrying his name and logo. He expanded into new markets that "to most Paris fashion designers ... is rank heresy."

The business initiatives included a contract with American Motors Corporation (AMC). Following the success of the Aldo Gucci designed Hornet Sportabout station wagon interiors, the automaker incorporated Cardin's theme on the AMC Javelin starting in mid-1972. This was one of the first American cars to offer a special trim package created by a famous French fashion designer. It was daring and outlandish design "with some of the wildest fabrics and patterns ever seen in any American car".

The original sales estimate by AMC was for 2,500 haute couture "pony" and muscle cars. The special interior option was continued on the 1973 model year Javelins. During the two model years, a total of 4,152 AMC Javelins received this bold mirrored, multi-colored pleated stripe pattern in tones of Chinese red, plum, white, and silver that were set against a black background. The Cardin Javelins also came with the designer's emblems on the front fenders and had a limited selection of exterior colors (Trans Am Red, Snow White, Stardust Silver, Diamond Blue, and Wild Plum) to coordinate with the special interiors. However, 12 Cardin optioned cars were special ordered in Midnight Black paint.

Prior to working with AMC, Cardin collaborated with French automaker Simca to produce a Cardin edition of the Simca 1100, released in 1969 for the 1970 model year.

Other interests

Pierre Cardin with the "utilitarian sculptures" Cobra Table and Chair, 2012

Cardin owned a palazzo in Venice named Ca' Bragadin. Although he claimed that this house was once owned by Giacomo Casanova, some scholars have argued that it was owned by another branch of the Bragadin family, and that its usage by Casanova was "somewhat unlikely".

Personal life

Cardin self-identified as being mostly gay, but in the 1960s he had a four-year relationship with actress Jeanne Moreau. His long-term business partner and life partner was fellow French fashion designer André Oliver, who died in 1993.

Death

Cardin died on 29 December 2020, at the American Hospital of Paris, in Neuilly-sur-Seine, at the age of 98. No cause of death was given.

Distinctions

• France: Knight of the Order of Arts and Letters (February 1983)
• France: Commander of the National Order of Merit (May 1985)
• Italy: Grand Officer of the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic (23 September 1987; Commander: 2 June 1976)
• Japan: Order of the Sacred Treasure, Gold and Silver Star (May 1991)
• France: Commander of the Legion of Honour (January 1997; Officer: April 1991; Knight: April 1983)
• Belarus: Order of Francysk Skaryna (7 January 2004)
• Monaco: Commander of the Order of Cultural Merit (2007)
• Russia: Order of Friendship (24 June 2014)

Further reading

• Carter, Ernestine (1980). Magic Names of Fashion. Prentice Hall. pp. 122–127. ISBN 0-13-545426-3. OCLC 7017601.
• Lorenz, Sylvana (2006). Biographie de Pierre Cardin (in French). Paris: Calmann-Lévy.
• Thiollet, Jean-Pierre (2021). "Pierre Cardin", in Hallier L'Edernel retour. Paris: Neva Editions. pp. 253–270. ISBN 978-2-35055-295-8.

External links

• Official website
• Pierre Cardin Museum
• Pierre Cardin discography at Discogs