The French born designer invented the revolutionary method of cutting fabric on the bias, creating clothes that draped the wearers figure and clung to curves in sensuous folds. She was a groundbreaker not just for the bias cut, nor the use of satin, unusual in her time, but she also invented and popularised the halter neck, another style with staying power.
Early influences from Paris haute couture
Madeleine Vionnet apprenticed under the houses of Doucet and Callot Soeurs in Paris, both avant-garde, innovative names on the eve of World War One. It was they who turned the tide of fashion away from the restrictive Edwardian frills and flounces, and popularised a high-waisted, flowing, relaxed style. This style became known as Third Empire, harking back to the same loose style favoured a hundred years earlier.
These relaxed influences can be seen in Madeleine Vionnet’s work from a very early stage, but it was in 1930s costume and to a slightly lesser extent 1940s costume however, that she was to become a renowned fashion leader.
MGM Studio style-1930s costume
Madeleine Vionnet’s influence is seen not just in Paris haute couture of that period, but also across the water, as MGM studios and Hollywood embraced her style. Marlene Dietrich and Greta Garbo were two legends of the silver screen that wore Madeleine Vionnet designs.
One of the reasons the dresses worked so well on screen was their movement, molding the body without drawing the eye away with unnecessary detail; a godsend for the camera. This led to her style being extensively copied by Hollywood costumiers.
Madeleine Vionnet – art and inspiration
Her aim was to create dresses of timeless style and beauty, and she took inspiration from classical Greek dress, where the clothing seems light, airy and in motion. She even went so far as to say that fashion did not interest her, she was interested in creating a wearable work of art.
Perhaps this explains why Vionnet is not such a household name as Chanel; equally talented, Vionnet shunned all publicity and self- promotion. If Chanel was the undisputed queen of chic daywear, in whose clothes you can be free to move, Vionnet was her evening equivalent. The exquisite dresses all owe their effortless elegance to the drape and the cut rather than embellishment.
Madeleine Vionnet worked in materials that helped the drape of her dresses, silk, satin and Morrocan crepe. She was known as an architect as well as a designer, paying careful attention to the construction of her clothes down to the tiniest detail. She was unusual also as she created her designs not as drawings first but as little miniatures on dolls, as dressmakers had done centuries before.
Some dresses were covered in stunning beadwork in muted tones, but these were even simpler in cut in order to create a single emphasis. Vionnet, again like Chanel, based her work on an obvious ‘less is more’ philosophy, in keeping with the Art Deco principles of the times.
Legacy in Paris haute couture
It’s amazing how intensely wearable Madeleine Vionnet’s dresses still are. The timeless appeal is as fresh today as the day they were created, more than eighty years ago. Every woman is transformed in clothes like these, they are desperately feminine, but there’s nothing girly about them. These are dresses for women, not girls or china dolls.
Her feminine but unfussy style has gone on to influence modern designers in Paris, most notably John Galliano, Halston, Comme des Garçons and Issey Miyake; proof that Vionnet achieved her aim to stand apart from the whirlwind of fashion.
Her success can be measured by how many women still want the timeless elegance of Marlene Dietrich and Greta Garbo, dressed by Madeleine Vionnet.
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