Thierry Mugler, the designer who made the bodies spectacular

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Huge fashion designer, Thierry Mugler had an original and daring vision of the woman he dressed for years: conqueror while remaining sexy.Star of the 1980s, he is also at the origin of a mythical perfume: Angel.Physically, he metamorphosed, granting a preponderant part to an appearance he had chosen, a moult accompanied by a name change: Manfred.

The flamboyance of his exceptional work as a designer, but also of a photographer, is still to be discovered in the exhibition of his creations at the Museum of Decorative Arts until April.He has just died (natural death, according to his agent's statement) on Sunday at the age of 73.

Strasbourg of original, Thierry Mugler first opted for a dancer's career - the body already.He customized his own outfits and quickly became a creator when he arrived in Paris.He created his first models for Gudule.In 1973, a first brand was called Café de Paris before he launched himself under his name.

Very quickly, he imagines a very defined and built style.He offers a vision of the woman who ends up winning in her time.His clothes are very structured, the architectural cut, the build is wide, exacerbated, and the size of wasp marked.

Jean-Jacques Picart, who was his press attaché from 1974 to 1980, remembers having a love at first sight for this "surreal, beautiful, thin character, in the dancer's physique and inhabited by Hollywood".He adds: "He made parades like a director built a film and he chose a role in the film where his fantasies paraded...The other creators made dresses, he created a universe."He concludes:" He was happy all his life.»»»»»»»»»»»»»»»»

A Star is Born

A first shop in his name opens place of victories in Paris, while his name will put around the world, including in Japan, with successful licenses.If his wife is a conqueror, she is with seduction, sometimes provocation. Il la transforme en sirène ainsi la spectaculaire robe «Chimère»»»»»»»»»»»»»»»» à écailles portée par Adriana Sklenaříková (connue plus tard sous le nom d'Adriana Karembeu) en 1997.A dress so heavy that during a series of photos, the top model that wore it almost passed out after fifteen minutes vertically.The session ended with the clothing horizontally, in a lying position.

Mugler CARROSSE The women of Harley Davidson, transforms them into soubrettes, into nurses.Fashion is an endless playground for him. Il y ajoute aussi l'humour avec un tailleur imitant les pneus d'une voiture ou encore en faisant défiler des insectes avec des «bzzzzz»»»»»»»»»»»»»»»» sur la bande-son du show.

Robe «Chimère»»»»»»»»»»»»»»»» exposée au musée des Arts décoratifs, dans le cadre de l'exposition Couturissime.|Christophe Archambault / AFP

Its parades are spectacular, its sense of innate staging.For the twentieth anniversary of his house, grand, the Parisian Winter circus room was full (part of the spectators had been able to buy a place).The iconic models of the house succeeded each other, carried by the tops of the moment and a host of personalities including Patricia Hearst, Tippi Hedren, Cyd Charisse and also a Magistral James Brown Interpreting "Sex Machine"»»»»»»»».

If the woman was the great success of Thierry Mugler, he also imagined men's models, always with exacerbated build.He had also opted for the Mao pass, including a model carried by Jack Lang made, in 1985, scandal with the public of the National Assembly where the tie was essential.

In 1998, he began to create sewing collections and his insect parade remains a real event.But Clarins, who has become the owner of the brand, decides to end the sewing first.Finally, Thierry Mugler also stops ready-to-wear in 2002.

In a few years, the fashion world has changed.Thierry Mugler will notice it in 2007: “Today the parades are something else, a marketing phenomenon.Girls look alike, soulless skeletal hangers.When I created collections, I worked with personalities, there was only that who amused me.At least we bandaged a little for Iman or Sayoko...I worked in the old fashioned, directly on girls, with a story built for actresses who fell into a scenario.»»»»»»»»»»»»»»»»

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— 가이스트 Fri Aug 03 03:59:23 +0000 2018

The fashion of the 80s, a refuge value?

At a time when few creators had risked scents, he developed, with Véra Strubi and in partnership with Clarins, an extremely original project.He wants a scent with accents of jam, chocolate, a kind of gourmet at tea time.After several tests which he refuses, he is seduced by the work of Olivier Cresp, the perfumer who has the amazing idea of using the ethyl-maltol, a food note.The latter will eventually revolutionize contemporary perfumery and upset the market introducing the notion of "gourmet"»»»»»»»»»»»».

In 1992, success was not immediate, but the brand persisted and Angel, with its star bottle and blue juice, became a myth and the number 1 sales in France for years.But this huge success cannibalise a bit of Mugler's fashion.The stars are multiplying on accessories and blue becomes essential.This cosmetic success projects towards the future while fashion remains very 1980s.

A page will turn to Mugler fashion, but the designer continues to develop scents successfully.He works on concepts and is also the artistic director of images with audacity such as the Bodybuilding robot of A*Men or the mutant Janusien of his cologne (with his s molecule as sex or sperm?).

PERFUM A*Men by Thierry Mugler

Mugler fashion will be relaunched later with various artistic directors, including David Koma or currently Casey Cadwallader.The house and its perfumes were sold by Clarins at L'Oréal in 2020.

In 2007 Thierry Mugler, absent from the fashion sphere and in the midst of metamorphosis, had accepted that I interviewed him on the theme of the body for the False q Cultural Journal.When I arrived, I was surprised by his physique who had changed a lot, but in two minutes, all smiles, he made me completely comfortable during an interview happily punctuated by the consumption of Milk muscle [aprotein drink, editor's note] and bananas.

He explained: "It's very interesting to change your body, maintain it and repair it.I had sports accidents...I found myself a little feared....It is something that helps me, I who lives a lot in the imagination.I have a body building diet, it doesn't laugh!Seven meals per day.»»»»»»»»»»»»»»»»

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Director

After leaving fashion, he worked for shows.For the Théâtre du Soleil, he designs Zumanity, a show for adults for which he wanted to "bring a humanity to these disembodied creatures of the world of circus and acrobatics...To arrive at the personality "»»»»»»»»»»»»»».

In 2013, he returned to a Parisian theater with Mugler Follies where the paintings partially resumed his mythical outfits: insects, fatal women and humor...

The Wyld in Berlin extended his staging story with Cindy Sander.

Throughout his career, he dressed personalities, especially the singers, starting with Mylène Farmer or Beyoncé.In 2019, for the Met Gala, Kim Kardashian asked that one of his iconic clothes be reconciled to his measurements.

With the disappearance of Thierry Mugler, it's a whole era that probably revisits with nostalgia for many.Donald Potard, fashion consultant and former president of the Jean-Paul Gaultier group, pays tribute to him on Instagram:

"Upset by the death of a very very great designer and an accomplice who revolutionized the fashion of the 80s and 90s.Thierry Mugler was once the first among the creators, with his hyper sexualization of the body;His last retrospective said everything about his genius.I remember each of its dream and madness parades both for ready-to-wear and for the haute couture that we launched the same season in January 97 with JP Gaultier.Goodbye to a whole era of madness and creativity.The fashion world is in mourning of itself today.»»»»»»»»»»»»»»»»