Louis Féraud (13 February 1921 – 28 December 1999) was a French
fashion designer
Fashion design is the Art (skill), art of applied arts, applying design, aesthetics, clothing construction, and natural beauty to clothing and its Fashion accessory, accessories. It is influenced by diverse cultures and different trends and has va ...
and
artist
An artist is a person engaged in an activity related to creating art, practicing the arts, or demonstrating the work of art. The most common usage (in both everyday speech and academic discourse) refers to a practitioner in the visual arts o ...
.
In 1950, Louis Féraud created his first "Maison de Couture" in
Cannes
Cannes (, ; , ; ) is a city located on the French Riviera. It is a communes of France, commune located in the Alpes-Maritimes departments of France, department, and host city of the annual Cannes Film Festival, Midem, and Cannes Lions Internatio ...
and by 1955 had established a couture house in Paris on 88, Rue du Faubourg Saint Honoré and 57, rue Pierre-Charron.
From the mid-1950s he was dressing the Parisian elite and designed the wardrobe of
Brigitte Bardot
Brigitte Anne-Marie Bardot ( ; ; born 28 September 1934), often referred to by her initials B.B., is a French former actress, singer, and model as well as an animal rights activist. Famous for portraying characters with Hedonism, hedonistic life ...
for many of her movies. It wasn't however until 1958 that he presented his first
haute couture
(; ; French for 'high sewing', 'high dressmaking') is the creation of exclusive custom-fitted high-end fashion design. The term ''haute couture'' generally refers to a specific type of upper garment common in Europe during the 16th to the ...
collection in Paris.
In the early 1960s, Louis Féraud hired the designers
Jean-Louis Scherrer,
, and
Per Spook.
In 1970, he signed a contract with Fink (Germany) for a ladies'
prêt-à-porter
Ready-to-wear (RTW)also called ''prêt-à-porter'', or off-the-rack or off-the-peg in casual useis the term for garments sold in finished condition in standardized sizes, as distinct from made-to-measure or bespoke clothing tailored to a parti ...
(ready-to-wear) collection. The year 1978 was an excellent one for Féraud: he won the "
Golden Thimble Award" for his Spring/Summer 1978 Haute Couture Collection. He went on to claim this accolade again in 1984.
In 1981, he created the fragrance ''Fantasque'' and selected
Avon cosmetics to distribute it in 1982. It was the company's first designer perfume and proved to be an instant success. Feraud followed up with two more fragrances created in collaboration with Avon: ''Vivage'' in 1984 and ''Cote d'Azur'' in 1988.
Meanwhile, his collection of honours continued to grow when Louis Féraud was elected Prince de l'Art de Vivre in 1991. In 1995, he was decorated Officier de la
Légion d'honneur
The National Order of the Legion of Honour ( ), formerly the Imperial Order of the Legion of Honour (), is the highest and most prestigious French national order of merit, both military and Civil society, civil. Currently consisting of five cl ...
, by the French President. His daughter Kiki signed her first Haute Couture collection with Féraud in 1996. In September 1999, the Dutch group Secon acquired Féraud. He died that December, aged 78, after a long and severe battle with
Alzheimer's
Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a neurodegenerative disease and the cause of 60–70% of cases of dementia. The most common early symptom is difficulty in remembering recent events. As the disease advances, symptoms can include problems wit ...
.
The year 2000 saw Yvan Mispelaere join the group as artistic director and that July witnessed his first Haute Couture fashion show in "
Musée des Monuments Français" in Paris. In 2002, the German
Group ESCADA took 90% of the Féraud shares and Yvan Mispelaere left the company. Later that year, Féraud decided to concentrate its activities on ladies' ready-to-wear and licences, with Jean-Paul Knott selected as Creative Director for the luxury ready-to-wear market.
In 2003, Jean-Paul Knott left Féraud and that July the worldwide flagship store opened in Paris at 400 rue Saint-Honoré.
References
External links
*
1921 births
1999 deaths
French fashion designers
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