Jean-Paul Gaultier: Stars turn out for designer’s final show
French fashion designer Jean-Paul Gaultier ends a 50-year career with his last couture runway show. …
Image copyright Getty Images/ AFP Celebrities have descended on the final fashion show of French designer Jean-Paul Gaultier in Paris, as he bows out after a 50-year career.
Former French first lady Carla Bruni was among the guests photographed at the Paris Fashion Week event.
Gaultier shocked fans when he announced it would be his last haute couture runway last week.
He said the event, at the city’s Théâtre du Châtelet, would be a “party” to celebrate his decades in fashion.
Gaultier, 67, has dressed stars from Nicole Kidman and Cate Blanchett to Lady Gaga and Rihanna.
He designed Madonna’s “cone bra” corset, which she wore for her 1990 Blonde Ambition tour.
Other stars at the Haute Couture Spring/Summer 2020 show included American actress and model Larsen Thompson and Czech-Italian supermodel Eva Herzigova.
French designer Christian Louboutin – known for his signature red-soled stiletto shoes – was pictured with Lebanese-born British pop singer Mika.
The show comes less than a week after Gaultier tweeted a video announcing that this runway would be his last.
“It’s going to be quite a party with many of my friends, and we’re going to have fun until very, very late,” he said.
Gaultier posted videos of models getting ready backstage on Twitter earlier in the evening.
‘Emotional night’
Ahead of the show, Burlesque model Dita Von Teese posted on Instagram that some of his “legendary muses” would be taking part.
She predicted it would be an “emotional night” and, in an earlier post, wrote: “I’m so grateful to have been part of the story.”
Last year Gaultier criticised what he called “ridiculous” fashion waste, saying big fashion brands are harming the planet by producing “far too many collections with far too many clothes”.
At the opening of the event in Paris, he called the outfits on the runway his “first upcycling haute couture collection” and urged the audience to recycle their clothes.
“In my first show and this, my last, there are creations made with the jeans I’ve worn,” he said.
“It’s the most beautiful of materials. Like a lot of humans, it becomes even more beautiful as it gets older.”
He added: “Goodbye to the spanking new, hello to the spanking old!”
‘Surreal’
Canadian model Coco Rocha tweeted that it was “surreal” that this would be Gaultier’s last show.
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American actress and model Kat Graham described him as her “fashion idol”.
“JPG was the first big design house to dress me, to believe in me,” she wrote.
“Thank you JPG for showing me and the world that it’s more than ok to be authentically yourself, and to go against the grain.”
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