Story of one brand: Thierry Mugler
There are many brands in the world that we love inside and out.. We hunt for their stuff, ready to buy all the rail on the sale and look forward to showing new collections. It's time to figure out what the phenomenon of their attractiveness. Today we will talk about Thierry Mugler - a brand with uncompromising feminine aesthetics, which had a bad time, but now he seems ready to rise from his knees. A neckline that does not hide anything, a narrow waist, accented shoulders and other things that Cher would wear with pleasure (and wore) revolutionized in the eighties and forced to re-prove their viability in the age of girls in sneakers.
The story of Thierry Mugler is from a series of stories about a train that could ”: a boy from an ordinary family conquered Paris and made history. He was born in a simple family in Strasbourg, but he immediately chose sophisticated hobbies - he studied ballet in his childhood, at 14 he began performing at the National Opera of the Rhine and at the same time graduated from painting courses at the Strasbourg School of Decorative Arts. In 1968, he decided to move to Paris, where it was definitely more fun. Then everything developed rapidly: Thierry arranged in a network of Gudule boutiques as an artist according to sketches and designer, Thierry develops collections for fashion houses from Barcelona, Paris, Milan and London, Thierry shows the first nominal collection in 1973. By the way, she caused cognitive dissonance in the fashionable public: against the background of the minimalist sixties with their straight silhouettes and futurism, Mugler's deliberately sexy outfits looked at least extraordinary. The future couturier was inspired by the fifties, but he interpreted them in his own way - unlike Dior, he was not afraid to strip the breasts and legs of future clients. This eroticism eulogy attracted the attention of Melki Trenton, the fashion editor of the French ELLE. Impressed with the work of a young designer who promised to become a major player in the market, Trenton took him under her wing: for example, at her invitation, Mugler would show her collection in Japan.
Creating your own brand was only a matter of time, and in this case, short-lived: the Thierry Mugler name brand appeared in 1974. Thierry did not belong to the number of young fashion designers who are rushing around in search of his style, - he very clearly identified the brand’s DNA in the first collection. Thierry Mugler is a waist in a narrow compound corset, these are bandage elements and the aforementioned cleavage, this is a lot of naked body, transparent fabrics, high cuts and excessive decor. In addition, the cosmic-futuristic course, which the industry in the sixties adhered to, left an imprint even on the aggressively sexy clothes of the brand: these dresses are easier to imagine on Barbarella than on Veronica Lake.
But behind the persistent aspiration to undress the woman as cunningly as possible, there was a completely classical idea of worshiping the female body: the lines of cut and decoration repeated anatomical contours, and the silhouettes often resembled antique or even Egyptian clothes. The propensity for a certain theatricality was not dictated by the desire to throw dust into the eyes. It was just that Thierry did not have enough of the prêt-à-porter women's fashion alone, he wanted to learn new forms. In 1977, he arranges the first show-performance, producing it independently. In 1978, he opens a boutique in Paris and launches the men's L'homme Mugler line. He works with men's clothes as boldly as with women's clothes, but, obviously, it completely suited buyers: men all over the world willingly bought avant-garde models of a young designer.
In fact, Thierry Mugler was Tom Ford of his era. There is such a type of people whose talent lies in the fact that they get absolutely everything. Being engaged in two lines of clothing, the designer in parallel was fond of photography. In 1988 he released his first album of photographs "Thierry Mugler, Photographe" with pictures from travels. A little later, the second book "Fashion Fetish Fantasy" was published, the name of which reflects the work of Mügler more precisely. Do I have to say that serious photography did not prevent him from directing short films, clips and commercials? And in his spare time he created stage costumes - for example, he “dressed” the play “Lady Macbeth” in Comédie Française. One may be amazed at his managerial sense, but the fact remains: during this period of creative hyperactivity of the creator, the house Thierry Mugler experienced a period of its heyday. Despite the fact that this clothing was designed for a more than a wealthy buyer, they actually bought it. In 1992, the French Haute Couture Syndicate asked Thierry to make a haute couture collection - so he took the highest fashion bar.
The whole 92nd year Mugler spent under the lucky star. It was then that he was visited by the idea, which still brings significant dividends to the Thierry Mugler brand: Thierry decided to create a perfume. But the standard solutions of his, that obviously, never really interested, so the designer launches a revolutionary in form and content of the fragrance Angel. Firstly, it was the first fragrance, created without a single floral note: Mugler wanted to convey the angelic essence of any woman, recreating the smell of baking, which his mother prepared. So the basis of the aroma was the notes of praline and chocolate with patchouli. Secondly, never before Angel spirits were released in such an eccentric bottle - the legendary blue star for the brand was developed by the glaziers Brosse Master Glassmakers. In general, it was a bomb. The fragrance quickly became a sales hit, and on the posters with the slogan "Beware of Angels", the face of the model and wife of Mick Jagger, Jerry Hall, flaunted, and Thierry himself shot all the campaigns (Lagerfeld, hello). Then a few more perfumes were launched, but Angel remains the most successful in the history of the brand, and the best-selling fragrance in principle (he managed to bypass even the ubiquitous Chanel No. 5). Georgia May Jagger has become the face of flavor now, according to family tradition.
Doubtful laws of equilibrium do not always work in the industry, when a powerful take-off is followed by a no less rapid fall. But, unfortunately, it was they who worked for the Thierry Mugler: by the middle of the early nineties that had kicked off the brand began to fade. Financial problems started because Thierry, who did not want to follow aesthetic (and indeed no) tendencies, fell into the trap of his role: hypertrophied femininity stopped selling because it was replaced by androgyny. The designer was in the same position in which Galliano was up to the scandal: beautiful, beautiful, but horribly unfashionable. In 2001, the house became completely unprofitable and closed. As it turned out, at the time, but nonetheless.
And then there was agony. After Jean-Luc Testus’s vague attempt to breathe life into the dead body immediately after the creator left, hope reigned - in 2005 Thomas Engelhart came in, who took up the men's line. This brought the brand a serious commercial success, which cannot be said about the female part of the brand - from 2008 to 2010 Rosemary Rodriguez was engaged in it, and critics were scolded with as little fury as her creations for Thierry Mugler. The show of the brand closed the Moscow Volvo Fashion Week in the fall of 2009, and even the Russian public was able to see how bad everything was: the collection was coarse and fragmented, as if Rodriguez had crammed into it all kinds of clothes that came into her head, and spiced them with a company corset. In short, everyone was unanimously convinced that the brand was not a tenant.
Meanwhile, Thierry himself was all right. In 2002, he designed costumes for Cirque du Soleil, and in 2008 - for the Beyonce concert tour "I AM ...". With the latter, by the way, the story came out muddy: Chris March sued Mugler, one of the participants of the Project Runway show, who claimed that he created all the costumes for the diva together with the fashion designer, but did not receive a cent for it. In the same 2008, Mugler released the fragrance Womanity: as part of the campaign, a site of the same name appeared, where everyone was invited to share their vision of what it would be like to be a woman today.
The long and ornate history of Thierry Mugler, however, continued: the house was remembered in 2010, when Nicolas Formicetti was appointed its creative director. Lady Gaga's stylist (a dress made of meat is his idea) and Uniqlo's creative director had never worked directly on design before, but at first it didn't bother anyone. At the very first show, Formichetti Gaga performed with tracks created specifically for the show, Zombie Boy, found by the designer on Facebook, appeared in a male line advertising. But media is not always enough for commercial well-being: it soon became clear that the buyer goes to the store not for talented styling and not for powerful public relations, but for things that were outrageously unremarkable. In 2013, Nicolas left Thierry Mugler and went to Diesel (for which, by the way, makes cool collections). A little later, the brand management announced a new - and last - appointment: the post of creative director was taken by David Coma. “We want to start writing a new Mugler page and return the brand back to the fashion business card. We have the potential to upgrade, and I think it’s huge,” said Virginie Courten-Clarence, director of product development, marketing and communications for Mugler Fashion. And that was already interesting.
Let's start with the proud: David Coma has Georgian roots, and he is considered a British designer, but we know that he lived and studied in St. Petersburg. There, the fashion designer graduated from two courses of the Art and Industry Academy. Mukhina, but remained dissatisfied with it and flew to London, to the all-powerful Central Saint Martins. His graduation collection turned out to be the best on the course, and his master’s work won the Harrods Design Award and the Vauxhall Fashion Scout Merit Award. David has just graduated, but Megan Fox, Beyonce and Cheryl Cole have already appeared in his outfits. And there is nothing surprising in the fact that such a talented young designer was offered to revive Thierry Mugler. So far, he has made only one collection - a cruise, but it looks more convincing than anything that was released under the Thierry Mugler brand in the last twenty years. David does not exploit the brand's brand sexuality: the time for bare breasts and cuts before the groin is gone. Instead, he continues the brand's other traditions: anatomical cut and a love for the female body. Add to this his own minimalist aesthetics, a constructivist approach to the cut - and now, hooray, Thierry’s things again want to be worn. In the autumn, David will show the first full collection, and we are waiting for it with great interest.
As for the founder of the brand, Thierry Mugler himself is also fine. In addition to the line of perfume, he is engaged in his own show, which is now going on in Paris. He always said that he didn’t need inspiration for work — enough of a natural mind and acquired education. And judging by the fact that Thierry himself, unlike his brainchild, remained afloat all this time, he obviously knows what he is talking about.
Photo: The maison mugler
