Chantal Thomass - Plaisirs de Femmes - 2001
In the contemporary history of French fashion, Chantal Thomass has helped women's wardrobes evolve, imposed a style combining innovation and elegance, and suggested new behaviors. Thanks to her, lingerie has become a garment in its own right. This first retrospective, organized and presented by Sylvie Richoux, Curator of the Marseilles Fashion Museum, brought together two hundred of her creations, including a donation of eighty ensembles. Since her early days, Chantal Thomass has gently imposed her wild extravagances by hijacking dress codes and situations. The exaggerated femininity she invents is accepted because she knows how to delicately link the "sexual" attributes of women's clothing to masculine grammar. Her creations are punctuated by ties and suspenders, which she has repeatedly accessorized in her silhouettes. Leather is reserved for jackets and vests, but with integrated suspenders. She proclaims that she "doesn't like total looks" or "toe-to-toe" dress codes. Her aim is to "break up" a very feminine dress with men's shoes, or to reveal a sexy garter under a man's suit. It also means rolling up the sleeves of shirts in men's fashion. Chantal Thomass's subtle blend of masculine and feminine, and the interplay between them, avoids the primness of smooth magazine femininity and opposes the image of the woman as object. Her creations stand in opposition to haute couture, which conveys a fixed, inaccessible feminine icon. She prefers the idea of a woman who is free, alive and liberated, playing with her seduction.
