There can never be too many fashion-related TV shows for us to stream and divulge over, and immediately added to our must-watch list is Cristóbal Balenciaga, coming to Disney+ on January 19, 2024.
The series will chronicle the rise of the Spanish couturier from humble origins to fashion icon, with Alberto San Juan playing the starring role of Balenciaga. Created by Lourdes Iglesias, Aitor Arregi, Jon Garaño and José María Goenaga, the series will also include prominent and legendary figures from within the world of fashion including Carmel Snow (played by Gabrielle Lazure), Coco Chanel (played by Anouk Grinberg) and Christian Dior (played by Patrice Thibaud). The series will predominantly center around Balenciaga’s life following his move to Paris, in the wake of the Spanish Civil War. To say we cannot wait for January would be a major MAJOR understatement.
Watch the teaser trailer for Disney+’s Cristóbal Balenciaga below:

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We’re still coming to terms with the news that Jean Paul Gaultier is leaving the haute couture runway and now comes word that another big-name brand is hopping back into the high fashion spotlight. In a frankly shocking move, Demna Gvasalia has decided to bring haute couture back to Balenciaga.

It’s been 52 years since founder Cristóbal Balenciaga closed his atelier so there’s a lot riding on this return to haute couture. While there will be plenty of doubters since Gvasalia has become more synonymous with streetwear than couture, the designer has actually been planning this move for quite a while.

“For me, couture is an unexplored mode of creative freedom and a platform for innovation. It not only offers another spectrum of possibilities in dressmaking, it also brings the modern vision of Balenciaga back to its sources of origin,” Gvasalia shared with Vogue.

But don’t expect to see Balenciaga on this week’s haute couture schedule. We’ll have to wait until July and the Fall 2020 season to see if Gvasalia can successfully pull off a couture comeback.

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For example, a handful of the 20th century’s most legendary designers were closely tied to Naziism. In some cases, this is a byproduct of the historical circumstances: During the Nazi occupation of France, which began in 1940, designers were forced either to collaborate with the Nazis (who saw immense value in the French fashion industry, and even considered relocating it to Vienna or Berlin) or close their doors*. Although it’s understandable that some didn’t have the courage to resist Nazi occupiers, others went out of their way to embrace the regime. 

Below, we’ve assembled a list of five big-name designers with ties to the Nazi party:

Coco Chanel

Published in 2011, Sleeping with the Enemy: Coco Chanel’s Secret War exposes Coco Chanel‘s activities as a spy for the Third Reich. The New York Times review of the book opened thusly: 

“Gabrielle Chanel — better known as Coco — was a wretched human being. Anti-Semitic, homophobic, social climbing, opportunistic, ridiculously snobbish and given to sins of phrase-making like ‘If blonde, use blue perfume,’ she was addicted to morphine and actively collaborated with the Germans during the Nazi occupation of Paris.”

Cristobal Balenciaga 

Some suspect that Balenciaga’s success in Nazi-occupied Paris had something to do with the designer’s close relationship with Hitler’s ally, General Franco. According to Stitched Up by Tansy E. Hoskins, Balenciaga designed many dresses for Franco’s wife prior to the start of the war and, decades later, even came out of retirement to create a wedding gown for the fascist leader’s granddaughter.

However, he stood up to Hitler when asked to relocate the French fashion industry to Berlin: According to the designer himself, “Hitler wanted to transfer the French couture to Berlin. He sent six enormous Germans to see me … to talk about it. I said that he might just as well take all the bulls to Berlin and try and train the bullfighters there.”

Louis Vuitton

Louis Vuitton: A French Saga reveals that the leather goods house had strong ties to the Vichy regime in Nazi-occupied France. Louis Vuitton was the only brand allowed to operate a store on the ground floor of Hotel du Parc, which was used as the premises for France’s puppet government, led by Marshal Philippe Pétain. According to The Guardian, the luxury brand also produced items “glorifying Pétain, including more than 2,500 busts, a fact not mentioned in any of its business records.” 

The family’s eldest son, Henry, was a regular at a popular Gestapo cafe, and “was one of the first Frenchmen to be decorated by the Nazi-backed government for his loyalty and his efforts for the regime.”

Christian Dior

Although Christian Dior never professed Nazi sympathies, as an employee of Lucien LeLong during the occupation, he dressed a a clientele of wives and mistresses of high-ranking Nazi officers. Although his niece, Françoise, was vocal about her Nazi views, his sister Catherine (the Miss Dior), was a member of the Resistance.

Hugo Boss

The German designer joined the Nazi party in 1931 (Hitler came to power in 1933) and created the uniforms worn by the Hitler Youth. The company also used forced labor from Nazi prisoners in its factories. In 2011, the company issued a formal apology about its activities during the Second World War. 

[Hat tip: Stitched Up: The Anti-Capitalist Book of Fashion]

*For more about this, read Fifty Years of Fashion: New Look to Now, by Valerie Steele. 

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