This merchant, who came from a modest Abbeville family, became Marie-Antoinette’s dressmaker. He envisioned the first haute couture label and revolutionized fashion… before fading into obscurity. Story told by Virginia Giraud*.
High fashion was born in France in the 18th century.e century! Wanting to become the most beautiful queen in Europe, in 1774 Marie-Antoinette hired the services of a new fashion merchant, Mademoiselle Bertin. A young entrepreneur from a modest family in Abbeville became the patron of the Duchess of Chartres after making her wedding dress, embroidered with matte and shiny silver threads. Her new boutique, Au Grand Mogol, located on the rue Saint-Honoré in Paris, has about thirty employees. Under the ancien regime, fashion merchants did not frame dresses. They take care of the “jewelry”. This ranges from adding ribbons and laces to hair accessories, including bags, muffs, purses, shoe jewelry…
But for her sovereign, Rose Bertin goes much further. He conjures up what we would call today… the look. To better arouse the desire of her customers, who envy the style of Marie-Antoinette, elevated to the title of “model-influencer”, she constantly updates her collections. Rose Bertin is not just selling frivolities. She contributes to the liberation of women’s bodies from aristocracy. When Marie-Antoinette arrives at Versailles, the ladies must wear court dress. It consists of a body with whale bones, a kind of straight jacket that thickens the chest, straightens the back and flattens the stomach thanks to a hard triangular piece that goes down to the pubis. On the waist thus preserved, we place a basket, which gives volume to skirts and skirts with trains. The weight of the complete outfit sometimes exceeds ten kilograms and remains heavy on the skeleton.
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Goli’s clothes scandal
As the Queen hated these stylistic restrictions, Rose Bertin offered her Polish-style dresses with a simple corset and ankle-length skirts that were thrown back from the fabric ‘ass’. The body gains freedom of movement, which is a joy for Marie-Antoinette, who attends several balls a week. In the early 1780s, the designer envisioned the so-called “en gaulle” dresses. These are long shirts made of white fabric – cotton, tulle or silk – with a wide colored band around the waist. The silhouette is completed outside with a simple straw hat decorated with ribbons, flowers or feathers. At the Petit Trianon, the Queen’s private estate, all the ladies wear this refined, country style. But outside of this Eden we cry scandal. Wearing a nude dress or being naked, what’s the difference? Imagine Kate Middleton walking around in a nightgown.
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Rose Bertin charges an exorbitant price for her services. you have to pay for its raw materials, labor and label, although this term does not exist yet. The Queen spends an amount equivalent to a million euros annually at home. While bread was often in short supply in Parisian bakeries, Marie-Antoinette was criticized for latrines and distractions from the public treasury. Stigmatized as the queen’s fashion merchant, Rose Bertin saw her business decline during the Revolution. At the beginning of the First Empire, he would become an icon that all young designers would aspire to surpass, just as Gabrielle Chanel would be after World War II. With one difference, and no less, who remembers Rose Bertin today?
Discover other historical figures on the podcast with Virginia Giraud At the heart of the story ,
Source: Le Figaro
