Fashion Flashback: Madame Carven

Fashion Reverie looks back at one of the pioneers of French pret-a-porter, Madame Carven. Madame Carven died on June 8, 2015. She was 105 years of age.

Born Marie-Louise Carven, Madame Carven founded her fashion house in 1945 to fill the void of the few couture houses left in Paris after the ravages of World War II.  A petite woman—she barely stood 5 feet tall—Madame Carven also sought to make clothes that looked good on smaller frames. Though there were few luxurious fabrics available in Europe immediately after World War II, Madame Carven managed to scramble enough fabric together to present her first collection in 1945. “Young women,” she remembered, “had nothing to wear and even less to eat.”

The standout garment in her first collection was a skirted summer dress, created from a roll of cotton, striped mint-green and white, found in the attic of a chateau, and most probably purchased before World War I for the summer uniforms of servants. This garment, known as “La Griffe,” became Madame Carven’s signature silhouette.

Madame Carven immediately found a French client in actresses Leslie Caron, Edith Piaf, Zizi Jeanmaire, and Martine Carol, actresses and dancers who had a diminutive frame similar to hers. Madame Carven unlike her French contemporaries, Christian Dior and Balmain, shied away from using expensive fabrics. Instead, Madame Carven chose to use the less luxurious fabrics of pink gingham, broderie anglaise, Indian and Asian cottons.

Because Madame Carven used fabrics that were thought of as fabric for the masses, her transition into pret-a-porter in the early 1950s was an easy transition. In the late 1940s Madame Carven toured Japan, Indonesia, Thailand, Mexico, and Brazil with her collections modeled on petite models. By displaying her collections on shorter models, Madame Carven developed a loyal following in Asia, particularly in Japan, that stayed faithful for several decades.

Madame Carven designed the French Olympic team’s uniforms for the 1976 Olympics, uniforms for Air France and the Eurostar Staff. In the 1980s Madame Carven’s petite, polite fashion aesthetic went out of vogue, but saw a revival in 2009 with the appointment of Guillaume Henry as creative director.

Madame Carven produced several perfumes, of which La Griffe is her most famous. She was also awarded France’s Legion of Honor in 2009.

—Staff