Monday 4th February 2019

So many dresses at the V&A. And suits. And coats. But no trousers (well actually one pair maybe). Dior! A huge event. Sold out until April. Queues forming at 8.30 in the morning for desperate last min admission. What is Dior? Essentially a big skirt and a fitted bodice. Or occasionally a sheath. We all know the story. The first show, in 1947: a throng at the door. Yards and yards of lovely stuff, as Nancy Mitford put it, after the dismal wartime modes. Never before or since has a silhouette  penetrated so totally. The Gay Granny was walking on Dartmoor. A peasant came out of a hut. ‘Excuse me, M’m,’ she said, ‘is that the New Look?’ It was.

Ever since, the New Look has been new. It never tires. Although not worn, of course, except when, from time to time, something like it is revived for ladies’ summer dresses. Really Dior ploughed a tiny furrow and only for a short time, a mere ten years. But how exquisite, the minute variations of texture, colour, the restrained disciplined playing on the essential theme – which is the interplay of tailoring and drapery. Sometimes, in a jacket, there is both at once, the fabric seemingly caught in flight over the shoulders, but otherwise ruthlessly fitted. And the huge skirts, of course, a kind of dream of fabric held for a moment in a shape. Dior’s currency was modern – suits, jackets and skirts – practical office wear or suitable for shopping, yet there is as much fantasy in one of his grey flannel suits as in any fantastic 18th century embroidered, fringed, panelled, plumed pannier-ed ensemble.

I was enchanted, lifted out of my current darkness and fear. Just dresses. The presentation is superb, with lights and colours creating a wonderful illusion, for instance in the flower room. Most enchanting was the pink dress where somehow the net over-skirt appeared to stand free of the solid fabric under-skirt. And the cherry-blossom embroidered onto the net – just one gesture of blossom – magical. Fairy-work. So just dresses. Everything and nothing.

Even a Grey Flannel suit is a Dream in the Hands of Dior

Just a Touch of Fur. The Ravishing Simplicity

Ploughing the Narrow Furrow with Brilliance. Here the Variation is in the Texture – and the Bows. See Next Graph for Detail

Detail of Previous: the Texture is All

Princess Margaret’s Dior Dress for her 21st Birthday. It’s got Grubby and I don’t Like the Belt. But the Neck-Work is Fabulous: Held up by Magic 

John Galliano’s Idea of Dior: Crude

Raf Simmons doing Dior: All Wrong

Horrid Seams on Raf Simmons Dior Idea

Saint Laurent’s Vision of Dior: Perfect. Fabric Just Caught as a Dress

Saint Laurent: the Best Dior Follower

This One Just a Miracle: Fabric Held on the Cusp

This the Only Saint Laurent that Doesn’t Work: Hem Looks Rucked like a Mistake

This is the Cherry Blossom Net Dream but you Can’t see in Graph how the Net stands Free from the Under-skirt

This one a True Dior: Just Extraordinary: A Jewelled Shell, Perfectly Honed, Fluid although Absolutely Smooth: See Only Trousers in Background. 

Look at This: Drapery not Tailoring. A Miracle

This One in the Flower Section but Actually more like Christmas

Oh Glory! Yet Another Brilliant Interpretation of the Essential Shape

Saint-Laurent: Prints a bit Border-Line: Galliano Horror in Background 

The Finale Piece by Dior