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Worth lives again Reproduced from the Daily Telegraph, London, 20th January 2003 Worth: cult status in fashion industry By Hilary Alexander in Paris The spring/summer haute couture season has opened in Paris with an astonishing and audacious tribute to an Englishman who founded the French couture industry nearly 150 years ago. The name of Charles Frederick Worth - which, in the 19th century, had the cult status enjoyed today by Chanel, Prada or Gucci - is being hand-stitched inside a new collection of corsetry and lingerie. The collection, in flesh pink and black, combines the modern technology of stretch fibres and lace with the corsetry techniques Worth used to create exquisite hour-glass gowns for Queen Alexandra, wife of Edward VII; the Empress Eugenie, wife of Napoleon III; the English actress Sarah Bernhardt; and many of Paris's famous courtesans of the time, such as La Belle Otero. The corsets, each one based on the "under"-silhouette of an archive gown from Worth's heyday as the designer of sumptuous seduction to the rich, the royal and the raffish, will be available as de luxe ready-to-wear with a price-tag of £1,000. Made-to-order pieces, incorporating particular Worth signatures, such as the flounces of Brussels lace he devised for a dinner gown for Alexandra, then Princess of Wales, in 1883, will be much more expensive. The collection includes the familiar basque and bustier, which provided the well-to-do society women of the time with their answer to modern-day liposuction and breast enhancement, as well as suspenders and G-strings, more familiar to their great-great-grand-daughters. The corsets are made in Valenciennes lace, topstitched into knife-pleats or with decorative gathers and ruching. Bra cups feature 19th-century hook-and-eye details, which can be undone to reveal more cleavage and under-wiring modelled on that used by Mr Worth in 1882. The collection is designed by the young Italian designer, Giovanni Bedin, formerly an assistant to Karl Lagerfeld, the powerhouse behind Chanel. The revival of Worth as a de luxe corsetry brand is the brainchild of Mounir Moufarrige, the fashion entrepreneur who hired Stella McCartney to reinvent the Chloe label. Moufarrige, who acquired a minority stake in the House of Worth last year, is determined to restore the moribund Anglo-French fashion label to its rightful status. "Very few people realise that not only was Worth, an Englishman, the very founder of French haute couture, he was also the first couturier to devise the system of clothes for different seasons, the first to show his designs on 'models' and the first-ever to launch a perfume based on his success," he said, last night, as he supervised the unveiling of the corsetry collection at the Hotel Meurice. Worth's first perfume was Dans La Nuit. It was launched in 1928, but at the time was unrecognised as the driving force which would, nearly 100 years later, reign supreme as the financial raison d'ètre behind the haute couture business and, certainly, eclipse the "dresses of dreams" in terms of profit margins. Worth's more famous perfume, Je Reviens, is still a major seller today. Born into a family of solicitors in Bourne, Lincolnshire, in 1825, Worth worked for Swan & Edgar and then Lewis & Allenby, purveyors of silk to Queen Victoria, before moving to Paris in 1845. Although he never learnt to converse fluently in French, he changed the whole history of French fashion when he opened his first "maison" in the Rue de la Paix in 1857. His legacy is still being carried on by couturiers such as the Italian, Valentino, who last night was putting the finishing touches to a spring/summer collection marking his 42nd year in fashion. The British model, Jacquetta Wheeler, was the centre of attention in the Valentino atelier in the Place Vendome, as seamstresses put the finishing touches to an exotic printed silk gown inspired by a stained glass window in the church of Santa Anastasia in Rome. Mr Worth's value has surely been under-estimated. Return to Charles Worth
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