Paquin

"“I have always been interested in haute couture. I needed it for my main business, textiles, and clothing. I had previously followed the creations of Loiret, of Paquin… I wanted to make the street prettier, more attractive. Because it is the fashionable women’s outfits that embellish it. I had founded a small house: ‘Philippe et Gaston,’ on rue Saint-Florentin. In 1946, Mr. and Mrs. Gaston were getting old and asked to retire. I needed a designer. I turned to Lelong, who was president of Haute Couture, whom I knew well: I had provided him with fabric during the time of great shortage. Lelong couldn’t suggest anyone. I turned to Henri Fayol, my general director. He inquired and proposed someone from Lelong, a young designer with a good reputation, Christian Dior. I objected to Fayol that this young man certainly wouldn’t want to leave Lelong for Philippe et Gaston. Fayol insisted. I agreed to meet him.”"

"The events will suddenly greatly increase the role of the sponsor. On October 23, 1957, Christian Dior suddenly dies, struck down by a heart attack, during a treatment he was undergoing in Montecatini. Dior’s tragedy was his gluttony: he couldn’t resist a cake or dessert. “Boss, you’re too fat,” he heard every day. But the slimming diets he strained to follow imposed very tough physiological challenges on him. Several times, he had fainted. His disappearance creates a huge shock in the fashion world—Dior, before being admired, was very loved—and raises a concerning question about the survival of the company. In the fashion world, few houses have managed to overcome the loss of their creator, and there is no shortage of examples since Paquin, Rochas, Piguet, Relong, of survivals that couldn’t maintain their brilliance after the disappearance of such talents."