In 1967, while the world was heading towards a major social revolution, a group of Swedish artists and designers comprising photographer Carl Johan De Geer, Dagens Nyheter fashion reporter Rebecka Tarschys, textile designer Gunila Axén and artist Marie-Louise Ekman, embarked on an expedition to Paris to visit the most famous fashion houses in the French capital.
The main aim of the trip was not reporting about the latest trends and collections, but about what they thought was a dying phenomenon - haute couture.
Back in Sweden designers were already injecting a sense of optimistic modernity and innovation in their creations: Fontessa, the brand that Carl Johan De Geer briefly had together with his first wife, was a perfect example with its hand-printed pop patterns, so it was almost unconceivable for the four artists to see exclusive, upper-class designs made in Paris by old French fashion houses lasting for a long time.Yet they were wrong: even though haute couture didn't fit in the revolutionary spirit of the times, decades after that trip, it is still more or less alive today (albeit in a new incarnation...), while the fashion industry has radically mutated.
The results of that trip have finally been published by Orosdi-Back in a slim poster size (36x30cm) volume entitled Vi Hade Fel (We Were Wrong) - Paris 1967 that collects previously unpublished black and white images taken by Carl Johan De Geer (as a whole he took 2,000 pictures during the Parisian adventure), accompanied by an introduction (in Swedish) by Karina Ericsson Wärn.
The book tells the visual story of the quartet's visit to Paris, and follows the protagonists from one fashionable spot to the next, as they pose in the streets wearing garments borrowed from the various fashion houses.
The volume is a must for fan of French fashion who will find some forgotten looks by André Courrèges, Christian Dior, Jean Patou, Louis Féraud, Nina Ricci, Paco Rabanne, Pierre Cardin and Schreiber & Hollington in its pages (no Yves Saint laurent as they were thrown out of the atelier...) and quite a few street style shots as well, but it's also highly recommended to all amateur and professional photographers.
While trying to prove their theory about high fashion, Carl Johan De Geer indirectly managed to show the outstanding craftsmanship behind the designs he photographed, even though at the time he thought they were just bourgeois clothes (though in our eyes some of the designs pictured like Patou's look very modern), and also managed to capture the carefree spirit of their adventure and a freshness that many contemporary fashion images do not possess anymore (check out the images of Gunila and Marie-Louise wearing large white cotton bags during the short walk from Christian Dior's atelier to protect the designs from getting ruined and getting plagiarised or of Marie-Louise leaning against a car).
In the end De Geer & Co. did not chronicle a phenomenon that went into extinction but an industry that simply mutated into something else: old-fashioned, elitist and capitalist Haute Couture still exists for very few selected wealthy customers and only reaches the masses in its more accessible incarnation - a make up shade, for example - while fashion houses are not small ateliers, but part of larger conglomerates and holding companies. Though these images are the result of a fashion shoot based on incorrect perceptions (and have a punk attitude at the core - look at Carl Johan De Geer in Paco Rabanne), they undoubtedly remain an interesting page of fashion history.
Why did it take so long to see these images out?
Carl Johan De Geer : I heard that the next season of Mad Men has reached 1967.
What inspired originally the 1967 trip to Paris?
Carl Johan De Geer: It was an assignment from Sweden's largest daily newspaper, Dagens Nyheter.
Do you feel that the main aim of the pictures - proving that those fashion houses/trends would have been out of fashion soon - has been lost after all these years or that they still tell an interesting page of fashion history?
Carl Johan De Geer: The work I did, with my cheap and battered camera, was respectful and ambitious. I had no agenda, other than to make the pictures casual and natural.
Some fashion houses did not let you go out of the ateliers with the clothes – did you find it difficult to shoot inside the ateliers?
Carl Johan De Geer: All shooting was done without fuss, as fast as possible, indoors or outdoors, I did not care about it. Pictures can easily be taken anywhere.
Is it true you were thrown out of Yves Saint Laurent's atelier?
Carl Johan De Geer: Yes, they did not consider that Gunila and Marie-Louise had good hair and make-up.
Which designs borrowed for the shoots seemed to you more luxurious and therefore doomed to disappear more quickly?
Carl Johan De Geer: Christian Dior's.
Do you have a favourite picture as well?
Carl Johan De Geer: The image with two Citroên DS 19 and two Mini, and my (then) wife waiting by them, as if it was a day like any day. This image includes my goal as a photographer - to cath the casual moment.
The book introduction mentions the fact that French fashion houses were scared they would be plagiarised and that sketching and photographing were prohibited: did you feel at the time that these were founded or unfounded fears?
Carl Johan De Geer: We did feel that these fears were totally unfounded. There was nothing to plagiarise. We thought that the real talent was in London at that time.
Which was the biggest mistake you committed, thinking these clothes were outdated/old-fashioned and bourgeois or that the fashion houses would have disappeared?
Carl Johan De Geer: I still think that haute couture is a perverted phenomenon, because it's tailor-made and so expensive that only millionaires can afford it.
Do you feel that in a way you anticipated the modern debate about the role of haute couture and its impending death?
Carl Johan De Geer: I am a socialist, that answers the question.
Vi Hade Fel (We Were Wrong) - Paris 1967 by Carl Johan De Geer and Karina Ericsson Wärn is out now on Orosdi Back
Image Credits:
All images courtesy and copyright of Carl Johan De Geer
1. Vi hade fel cover.
2. Gunila in Christian Dior.
3. Marie-Louise and Gunila in Paco Rabanne designs with real flowers trapped in plexiglass.
4. Marie-Louise and Gunila with white cotton bags hiding the Dior designs.
5. and 6. Marie-Louise and Gunila; and the girls with Carl Johan; the girls are wearing in these pictures designs by Schreiber & Hollington, considered by them as the democratic, non haute couture alternative.
7. Marie-Louise.
9. Carl Johan in Paco Rabanne.
Member of the Boxxet Network of Blogs, Videos and Photos
Member of the Boxxet Network of Blogs, Videos and Photos
Comments