Marie-Louise Carven
Marie-Louise Carven , actually Carmen de Tommaso , (born August 31, 1909 in Châtellerault , Vienne , † June 8, 2015 in Paris ) was a French fashion designer. She is considered to be one of the most important designers of the post-war period.
Live and act
After studying architecture with her brother-in-law Robert Mallet-Stevens at the École des Beaux-Arts , Carven opened her first haute couture store in Paris in 1941 and her own fashion house Carven on the Avenue des Champs-Élysées in Paris in 1945 . She put her new name together from the first syllable of her first name and the last syllable of her aunt Josy Boyriven's name. According to her own statements, she wanted to produce haute couture fashion for women of her size - Carven himself measured 1.55 m - and to implement her own style. Her creations caused a sensation and were worn by Leslie Caron , Édith Piaf and Michèle Morgan , among others . Carven also created various fragrances , including Ma Griffe , Eau Vive and, inspired by her husband Philippe Mallet, Vétiver .
Carven attached importance to marketing early on. In 1950 she joined an initiative led by fashion designers around Jacques Fath and Pierre Balmainan , who worked with clothing manufacturers to produce ready-to-wear clothes . For the French film premiere of Gone With the Wind in 1950, she leaned a collection based on the film characters and showed the clothes in French cinemas. On the anniversary of the liberation of Paris in 1954, she dropped samples of her perfume Ma Griffe on parachutes. In 1955, Carven started its own junior fashion line and began to issue licenses. She also presented her collections abroad, for example in Egypt , Thailand , Morocco , Cuba , Brazil , Singapore and Mexico . Conversely, she was inspired by these places by using batik prints, African and Aztec motifs and naming her clothes amphora , Ivory Coast , Chiquita or opium .
Carven has designed costumes for films such as Die Teuflischen (1955), bridal wear, including the wedding dress for Anne-Aymone Giscard d'Estaing , and since the 1960s uniforms for more than 20 airlines. In 1977 she was commissioned by the city of Paris to design the uniforms of the Parisian traffic policemen. In 1993 she retired.
After the death of her first husband in 1966, Carven married the Swiss businessman and collector René Grog in 1972, who died in 1981. In 1978 Carven was appointed Chevalier de l ' Ordre des Arts et des Lettres and in 2009 he was appointed “Commandeur” of the Legion of Honor . On August 13, 2000, Yad Vashem honored her as Righteous Among the Nations . During the Vichy regime, she had hidden Henry Bricianer and his family, a Jewish fashion designer who had made a living as a seamstress after the “ Aryanization ” and was to be taken to the Drancy assembly camp in October 1943 . Her archive has been in the Palais Galliera since 2001 .
Web links
- Marie-Louise Carven at Google Arts & Culture
- Joelle Diderich: Madame Carven Dies at 105 . In: WDD , June 8, 2015.
- Marie-Louise Carven Liberté, égalité, féminité , FAZ June 9, 2015
- Marie-Louise carving in the Internet Movie Database (English)
Individual evidence
- ↑ Marie-Louise Carven on the website of Yad Vashem (English)
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Carven, Marie-Louise |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Tommaso, Carmen de (original name); Tommaso, Carmen Marie Louise Jeanne de (full name) |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | french fashion designer |
| DATE OF BIRTH | August 31, 1909 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Châtellerault , Vienne department |
| DATE OF DEATH | June 8, 2015 |
| Place of death | Paris |