Christian dior

Christian Dior was born in Granville, a seaside town on the coast of Normandy, France, the second of the five children of Maurice Dior, a wealthy fertilizer manufacturer and his wife, the former Isabelle Cardamone. He had four siblings: Raymond  Jacqueline, Bernard, and Ginette (aka Catherine).When Christian was about five years old, the family moved to Paris, France, but still returned to the Normandy coast for summer vacations.
Dior's family had hopes he would become a diplomat, but Dior was artistic and wished to be involved in art. He was gay, though not openly so.To make money, he sold his fashion sketches outside his house for about 10 cents each. In 1928, Dior left school and received money from his father to finance a small art gallery, where he and a friend sold art by the likes of Pablo Picasso Three years later, after the death of Dior's mother and brother and a financial disaster in the family’s fertilizer business, during the Great Depression that resulted in his father losing control of Dior Frères, the gallery had to be closed.
From then until about 1940 he worked with fashion designer Robert Piguet when he was called up for military service.
In 1942, when Dior left the army, he joined the fashion house of Lucien Lelong where he and Pierre Balmain were the primary designers. For the duration of World War II, Dior, as an employee of Lelong — who labored to preserve the French fashion industry during wartime for economic and artistic reasons — designed dresses for the wives of Nazi officers and French collaborators, as did other fashion houses that remained in business during the war, including Jean Patou and Nina Ricci While Dior dressed Nazi wives, his sister Catherine (1917—2008) served as a member of the French Resistance, was captured by the Gestapo, and sent to the Ravensbrück concentration camp, where she was incarcerated until she was liberated in May 1945.
On 8 December 1946 Dior founded his fashion house, backed by Marcel Boussac, a cotton-fabric magnate. The actual name of the line of his first collection, presented on 12 February 1947,was Corolle (literally the botanical term corolla or circlet of flower petals in English), but the phrase New Look was coined for it by Carmel Snow, the editor-in-chief of Harper's Bazaar. Dior's designs were more voluptuous than the boxy, fabric-conserving shapes of the recent World War II styles, influenced by the rations on fabric  He was a master at creating shapes and silhouettes; Dior is quoted as saying "I have designed flower women." His look employed fabrics lined predominantly with percale, boned, bustier-style bodices, hip padding, wasp-waisted corsets and petticoats that made his dresses flare out from the waist, giving his models a very curvaceous form.
Initially, women protested because his designs covered up their legs, which they had been unused to because of the previous limitations on fabric. There was also some backlash to Dior's designs due to the amount of fabrics used in a single dress or suit. During one photo shoot in a Paris market, the models were attacked by female vendors over this profligacy, but opposition ceased as the wartime shortages ended. The "New Look" revolutionized women's dress and reestablished Paris as the center of the fashion world after World War II.

Petra Dufkova

  Born in Uherske Hradiste, Czech Republic, Petra initially studied art at a technical school for applied arts.

  She moved to Munich, Germany and in 2008, graduated from the International Fashion School Esmond, with a Pret-a-porter collection.

  During her education at Esmond, she participated in numerous projects and contests, including winning Best Illustration award with her collection at China Fashion Week.

Petra's fashion, beauty and lifestyle illustrations combine traditional methods, with a modern look.

  She gets her inspiration from books, magazines, exhibitions and fashion shows.

Petra currently works as a freelance illustrator, stylist and fashion designer in Munich, Germany.

  What I love about her technique is that her lines are so perfected, almost as if they had been created using a program. This makes her work look so crisp and modern, which is exactly why her main focus is on the edgy world of fashion illustration. However, her pieces are almost too good to feature in the 'throw-away' context of magazines

   Petra Dufkova’s illustrations can be described as a beautiful mess! She uses a combination of sketches, ink and watercolor to achieve her stunning pieces

  Most of us know fashion illustrations for their distinctive association with style and beauty. There is no doubt about that, however there is so much more to fashion illustrations that can inspire every designer, no matter what field you are in.

Daisy de Villeneuve

She’s been drawing in felt-tip since the age of three, but unlike the rest of us she’s forged a brilliant career out of it. Daisy de Villeneuve’s illustrations have adorned everything from Topshop shoeboxes to the pages of Vogue, but, says the fashionista, it hasn’t always been an easy ride.

It’s always referred to as childlike or naive, which shedon’t mind. she is known for drawing with felt-tip pens, but the end result is quite modern and worldly once she had added words to the picture and like the handmade feel to it, the rawness, when you can see the overlapping pen marks showing through.Topshop, Moët and Chandon, the V&A, British Vogue, Elle Decoration, Nylon, Lula Magazine, Habitat, Nike, Browns Focus, Boots, Random House in both the USA and UK, the Fashion and Textile Museum and Transport for London is her main clients.
 
she think it’s important to do both commercial work and exhibit. she think they are different forms of expression and markets too. Her commercial work is normally aimed at a target audience – the work she designed for Topshop is more teenage orientated, and she always think about the consumer when she sit down to draw. Commercial work pays the bills, so is a necessity, but she also really enjoy it and seeing her work in shops.
  As for clothing brands she like the classic style of Margaret Howell, A.P.C., Isabel Marant, Sonia Rykiel, plus Diane von Furstenberg , Ralph Lauren and Zac Posen because he makes dresses that fit well on any shape plus he’s a good friend of he.