{"id":27312,"date":"2026-05-29T21:17:11","date_gmt":"2026-05-29T21:17:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/27312\/"},"modified":"2026-05-29T21:17:11","modified_gmt":"2026-05-29T21:17:11","slug":"nobody-collected-couture-like-azzedine-alaia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/27312\/","title":{"rendered":"Nobody Collected Couture Like Azzedine Ala\u00efa"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Estimated6 min read<\/p>\n

In recent years, the word \u201carchive\u201d has taken up colloquial residence in popular fashion discourse. Runway shows feature \u201carchival\u201d references, red carpet dresses are pulled from \u201carchives,\u201d and \u201carchival\u201d fashion auctions fetch top dollar. But the archives weren\u2019t always so open. Many notable designers, like Jean-Paul Gaultier or Vivienne Westwood, never kept personal archives (though the brands likely do today). Except for a very special one belonging to Azzedine Ala\u00efa.<\/p>\n

The late French Tunisian designer, known for revolutionizing the way women dressed with bodycon silhouettes made from highly modern, technical fabrics, kept an archive of his creations from day one\u2014back when this was not the standard. His collections, though, spanned far beyond his own work. Throughout his entire life, Ala\u00efa collected precious pieces from designers he admired like Crist\u00f3bal Balenciaga, Christian Dior, Thierry Mugler, and Madame Gr\u00e8s. (For context, Dior started collecting his own work in \u201987, whereas Azzedine started collecting Dior in the late 1970s.) In doing so, he created vast archives that stretch beyond the in-house collections of these designers and brands themselves.<\/p>\n

La Fondation Azzedine Ala\u00efa, founded in 2007 by Ala\u00efa, Carla Sozzani, and Christoph von Weyhe, both preserves and exhibits these collections for the public. Since 2020, the foundation has presented four exhibitions dedicated not only to the collections of the designers Ala\u00efa so admired, but also to his own designs, fostering a dialogue between the aforementioned masters. The most recent, \u201cAzzedine Ala\u00efa and Christian Dior, Masters of Couture\u201d, opened in 2025.<\/p>\n

And as this exhibition prepares to close later this June, the foundation\u2019s president, Sozzani, and director Olivier Saillard have put the catalog into a book published by Damiani Books and now available for purchase in the United States. In tandem with that release, we spoke with Sozzani and Saillard about Ala\u00efa\u2019s legacy as both a couturier and a collector.<\/p>\n

Azzedine Ala\u00efa, Christian Dior. Two Masters of Haute Couture is now available for purchase via damianibooks.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"Azzedine<\/p>\n

Damiani Books<\/p>\n

What is special about this exhibition compared to the three you’ve already done?<\/p>\n

Olivier Saillard: The difference between this exhibition or catalog compared to the past is that when Azzedine first came to Paris, he worked at Dior for just four days. And it was absolutely a dream for him to walk through those doors. He stayed a very short time, but he developed a great, career-long admiration of the couturier. The catalog is also the explication of a young boy who became a great fashion couturier with a great admiration for Christian Dior.<\/p>\n

How obvious or how subtle would you say the influence of Dior is in Ala\u00efa’s work?<\/p>\n

OS: At the very beginning of the exhibition, we received a dress by donation that is probably the oldest piece we have of Azzedine\u2019s. It\u2019s from 1958, two years after he came to Paris. This dress was very much inspired by Christian. It’s very conformed to his style. They did some very different work, but, in general, the common shape between Ala\u00efa and Dior is the defined waist.<\/p>\n

Carla Sozzani: They worked at different times. Their work often looks different, but they both revolutionized fashion. Post-war, Dior famously went back to a long skirt and a defined waist. Azzedine\u2019s revolution came from stretch facilitating the movement of the woman. They are similar in that they did something incredible for their times.<\/p>\n

OS: It reminds me of a sentence Suzy Menkes wrote in the \u201980s. She said he was the only designer who shaped the decade. And I like this quote. He shaped the \u201980s like Dior shaped the \u201950s. But the big difference between Dior and Ala\u00efa are the fabrics. With Ala\u00efa, he never needed corsets inside the clothes. He made a revolution with the cutting of the fabrics, which were relatively much lighter.<\/p>\n

\"screenshotCourtesy Damiani Books<\/p>\n

Azzedine Ala\u00efa Haute Couture, Fall 2009<\/p>\n

These exhibitions are such a great segue into the conversation around preservation in fashion. Azzedine was such a pioneer in this respect.<\/p>\n

CS: He was the first one. Poiret was collecting fabrics. Balenciaga was collecting antiques. Nothing compared to couture. But what Azzedine collected were the masters of couture. He started with Balenciaga in \u201968. And after that, he never stopped. He never knew how many he had or didn’t have.<\/p>\n

OS: I’m very able to say that he was and still is the very first, most famous private collector devoted to the history of fashion. His collection is the most important. He set the patrimony for France, but also for fashion in general, with hundreds of masterpieces. I meet new collectors, but nothing compares with the collection of Azzedine.<\/p>\n

\"screenshotCourtesy Damiani Books<\/p>\n

Left to Right: Christian Dior Boutique, c. 1957, Azzedine Ala\u00efa Haute Couture, 1958<\/p>\n

\u201cArchival\u201d has become a sort of buzzword between red carpet references and the growing popularity of auctions. How rare was Ala\u00efa\u2019s personal archive?<\/p>\n

CS: I remember Jean-Paul Gaultier didn’t have anything. Vivienne Westwood didn’t have anything. At the time, nobody other than Azzedine was archiving his own collection. He kept everything from day one\u2014and in multiple colors and sizes. Rei Kawakubo kept some of her work, some of which she had given to the Kyoto Museum, but that was still quite unusual. Now, it’s become very important. For newer generations, brands know that without their archives, it\u2019s difficult to have a future. It’s important for the brand to have its history.<\/p>\n

Do you think this dedication to studying the greats via their designs was reflected in his own work?<\/p>\n

CS: He didn’t go to a tailoring school when he started. For 25 years, as a couturier, he dressed the women of high society, from normal women to Greta Garbo. That’s how he really learned. He was fascinated by the secrets of the big masters. He always said that he wanted to understand and perceive how they could do this. And I have to say that Azzedine became better than most of them.<\/p>\n

\"screenshotCourtesy Damiani Books<\/p>\n

Christian Dior \u2019Romance\u2019 Ligne Fl\u00e8che, Haute Couture, Spring 1956<\/p>\n

How important is it to keep an archive of these couturiers to preserve the techniques they used? <\/p>\n

CS: It’s the future. The craft is also very important today to make young people understand that they need to use their hands, they need to understand how it works. To be a couturier or a craftsman, it’s a novel job. Many today have lost this understanding of the importance of the craft, but it’s coming back in many collections, let’s say Chanel, for example. It’s not even a matter of taste, but the craft is very, very important there.<\/p>\n

OS: We are in a very different situation now. When all the same brands look at fashion via images from social media, we\u2019ve realized that it produces something very similar from brand to brand. We want to consider the power to create fashion from the clothes, not from the images. It’s completely different to appreciate fashion from an archive rather than from a picture. It’s also a pleasure to see the craft as a possibility of what we can create. It’s now something we feel could change.<\/p>\n

You titled the exhibition \u201cMasters of Couture.\u201d Why was that pertinent to these two specific designers? <\/p>\n

OS: Couture is something devoted to a man, a woman who is doing something by his own expression with an atelier or without. According to me, a couturier is like a writer. A writer just needs paper to write a story. Couture is that. it’s not a question of knowledge; It’s a question of whether you want to do it or not. And after that is a lot of technique. If we speak about Azzedine Ala\u00efa, we are talking about one of the most famous fashion designers or couturiers who was able to practice, to cut, to stitch. Knowledge is important, but there\u2019s something about the need to say, \u201cI want to be an artist, I want to be an author,\u201d not only for another brand, but for yourself.<\/p>\n

\"screenshotCourtesy Damiani Books<\/p>\n

Azzedine Ala\u00efa Haute Couture, Fall 2017<\/p>\n

How do you feel now, reflecting on the exhibition?<\/p>\n

CS: When you go and see the exhibition, it’s fascinating to see the young people\u2014they want to touch. They want to look under the skirts. The way the foundation staged the exhibition, it’s very generous because it lets people go up close\u2014while still remaining cautious, of course. You can start to learn at school, but you have no access to the clothes. And at a museum, most of the time they are under glass.<\/p>\n

OS: I think it’s very important to let clothes speak to the audience like a sculpture. We don’t put sculptures under vitrines. It’s very important to conserve, but it’s also important to create this dialogue, not only with the pieces themselves, but also with the audience, with visitors. We were always inspired by this kind of great exhibition, which is a proposal of dialogue between Picasso and Matisse, masters of art. We never see that in a fashion museum. We love to create a face-to-face dialogue between great masters, especially masters who collect one another.<\/p>\n

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"6 min read In recent years, the word \u201carchive\u201d has taken up colloquial residence in popular fashion discourse.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":27313,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12728],"tags":[2793,2957,20007,99,8655,98,4955,20008,20006],"class_list":["post-27312","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-christian-dior","tag-christian-dior","tag-content-type-feature","tag-contentid-3cad050a-1f3f-494d-8a88-56758187a161","tag-displaytype-standard-article","tag-issyndicated-false","tag-locale-us","tag-lvmh","tag-read_time-7","tag-shorttitle-nobody-collected-couture-like-azzedine-alaia"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27312","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27312"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27312\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27313"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27312"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27312"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27312"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}