I’m more a fan of the styling of the show, than of the individual pieces, but my favourite in the collection is probably the pink ribbon dress. I would love to dance in that… not that there’s much to it. It reminds me a little of Cyd Charisse’s green flapper dress in Singin’ in the Rain. Laura Glaess has a lovely recreation of that. Enjoy!

He didn’t only illustrate for Dior however, but for other designers and fashion houses including Pierre Balmain, Jacques Fath, Balenciaga, Elsa Schiaparelli, Rochas, Lanvin, Elizabeth Arden, and Hubert de Givenchy, and for many magazines including Marie-Claire, Femina, Elle, Vogue, Harper’s Bazaar, Flair, L’Officiel and Madame Figaro, not to mention those illustrations for The Moulin Rouge and Lido in Paris that you may recognise.

His illustrations shaped the path of Haute Couture, and influenced fashion itself, in a true life-imitating-art-imitating-life way. For me Gruau’s women are glamour and high-society, femininity and sensuality. When I see his illustrations I think of Paris, I think of Vogue, I think of champagne and the Moulin Rouge, and the French Riviera, of perfume and red lipstick. Gruau died at the age of 95 in 2004 – so recently! *sigh*

Visit the official Rene Gruau website here.

Here is the entire collection. I would normally just post my top picks, but I feel this one stands as a whole. Enjoy!

Sarah Mower on Style.com:

In a way, it was a classic: combining the indelible fifties inspiration of Lisa Fonssagrives, Dior mannequin and wife of Irving Penn, and that of the new model of French conservative chic, Carla Bruni-Sarkozy. Those two streams of thought merged into a collection John Galliano called “fresh couture—restrained and refined.” If it didn’t exactly result in 100 percent conventionality (there were plenty of sheer skirts and fetishistic patent belts that might not work at a political summit), the happy fact that the first lady of France has chosen to dress at Dior gave Galliano full rein to revel in the realms of glamour the house established 60 years ago.

The templates were all there: big coats, wasp waists, nipped jackets, circle skirts, tulle dance dresses, architectural gowns cut from spiraling lace and jutting scrolls of crin. Mostly framed in black and white, with tints of gray, caramel, Parma violet, mint, and chartreuse to follow, the shapes traced familiar silhouettes—albeit a familiarity shot through with Galliano’s irrepressible touches of perversity. A nod to Dior’s New Look peplum became a stiff patent hip-jutting belt with cross-lacing in the back, and a knowing acknowledgment of the basis of the hourglass silhouette came in a couple of see-through gowns with the corsetry fully on display. Still, this was Christian Dior very much under control and within the scope of reality. Add some lingerie and take off the belts, and it’s no stretch at all to imagine Madame Sarkozy finding plenty here to wow the world in her demure manner, come fall.