Customer Reviews

Madame Gres: Sphinx of Fashion

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I read about the Madame Gres exhibit at the NY Fashion Institute of Technology in the New York Times recently. Upon finishing the lengthy article I raced over to my laptop and was excited to order this book. For those who love,crave and have to surround yourself with beautiful visual images this is the book for you. To look at the actual photographs of her original pieces along with her photographs made me feel privileged to read about this amazing woman. The thousands of folds,tucks and pleats in her garments were obviously a lifelong labor of love!

Stunning! Well-written story of Madame Alix Gres in four chapters: 1 life and career, 2 the grecian gown, 3 ethnic influences, 4 sculpting with fabric. Full page (> 12" x 8") photographs of selected works over her entire range of career; the photographs are high-definition. Some fashions have multiple photographs from different angles. Photographs are full page, so they are often not on the page where the text is that describes the fashion, and there is occassional lack of reference to the accompanying photograph(s) (inconsistent use of stating which plate the text is referring to). I wish every fashion and every advertisement described in the text had a photograph.

I only knew a little of Madame Gres and this book brought to my attention that she was one of the major designers of our era--someone who "invented" the use of draping and fabrics, unlike they had ever been used before. Not just a product of its time, Madame Gres' fashions are timeless and have influenced everything since her time. I would highly recommend this book not just for the fashion, but for the very interesting text by the author, as well, who really puts the work in context.

Years ago someone gave me a sample of Cabochard perfume and I fell in love. Its designer was Madame (Alix) Grès, born Germaine Emilie Krebs in Paris in 1903. Just as she was to construct flowing Grecian gowns for high society and transform the use of fabric for the twentieth century, she was to construct and transform her own name, history and legend. Not much is known about the actual woman. The coutouriere let her soft, sculptured dresses speak for her; the elegance of her jersey creations was sought after by women of refinement. Then, fallen from the heights of the fashion world, done in by changing tastes and a sad attempt at pręt-a-porter, she became a turbaned recluse whose death was not announced for over a year. Her perfume company was sold; it is all that remains in active commerce but her myth and her frocks (usually held by private collectors although I have occasionally seen one on e-Bay) remind us of an original mind. Yale UP and the Fashion Institute of Technology, joint publishers, have issued a lovely large-format volume with photographs of both Madame and her clothes. Mears comes as close to the truth as we are likely to get.