VIVE LACROIX!

                                                                                                                                         Jose Lasheras.

I had to send off my measurements for a grand new production of Carmen in Nimes......in the Arena of 26,500 capacity.

This I did, hoping that they were correct, and euphemistically thinking that I would lose a couple of pounds before arriving for rehearsal. Normally measurements are taken by the dressmakers of the house when you arrive.

It was immensely hot and I was staying in a horrible modern box of an hotel outside the city and thus could not run around and study it as I worked. We rehearsed from 8pm until 2am. I turned up for my first fitting and the designer was there too......Disaster! 

The ravishing jacket in cobalt silk, which was hand painted all around in silver did not do up! and the seams had to be let out under the arms....which disrupted all of the narrative of the painting. The designer was truly forgiving....lovely, and we got on despite, as I watched his patience and calm eye for detail. We talked about so many things as the "sarte", the semstresses pinned and tacked away.

I felt that I had let him down and spent every day in my icebox hotel fretting, eating nothing and wondering how else to lose weight in such a hugely hot city, when I had to keep all of my energy in reserve for the nightime.

I think that he must have forgiven me for Christian Lacroix and I are still friends, and I have  his paintings, Christmas cards, jewellery, book and his most beautiful clothes for which I saved so long and now treasure more than ever.

His clothes are so impeccably made, truly exquisite in detail, shape, and colour with a flair that I have never seen before......and I shall do my best to remain in them for the rest of my days. 

They are cut to the body in a way that you rarely see and are always supremely comfortable as well as the most beautiful.

Our world needs this great talent and supremely gifted designer who understands entirely our shapes, lives and the way in which we express ourselves and need to inhabit our clothes.

All of this he interprets with the most veuve, brillo, daring panache and immense flair.

VIVE  LACROIX.