Mitzah Bricard's influence has always been indispensable at Dior. In 1954 she was a mauve silk two-piece. In 1997, a tulle evening dress in that color. In 2010, a lilac lipstick. Now Dior's wildest muse, the fabulous Mitzah Bricard inspires a makeup collection starring Anya Taylor-Joy.
%20muse%20of%20Dior%20who%20lived%20in%20the%20Ritz%20Hotel.webp "Mitzah Bricard, the great (and sc@nd@lous) muse of Dior who lived in the Ritz Hotel")
Mitzah Bricard lived at the Ritz Hotel, she didn't drop by Avenue Montaigne before noon, with her very high-heeled shoes and various pearl necklaces. She was haughty. Her colleagues complained about her treatment of them, but Christian Dior always refused to do without her muse Mitzah Bricard. "Would you like to see her work for another fashion house?" the dressmaker roared when they came up with a story about her. Which was not difficult: just remember that Bricard, born in Paris on November 12, 1900, as Germaine Louise Neustadt, was not a supporter of wearing panties.
This anecdote, which the monsieur himself collects in his autobiography Christian Dior and I, fascinates John Galliano, who during his time at the house did not stop invoking it. “She was she the last worldly woman!” he exclaimed on one occasion.
She was right: widow of a Romanian diplomat, she adopted her last name from her second husband, president of some laboratories. Her innate elegance and her mundane life opened the doors to Avenue Montaigne, which she crossed in 1946 as a printmaker. Obviously, her mission did not end there. The inventor of the New Look - a style in which she had a lot to do - did not take a step without her.
He admits it himself in her memoirs: "From time to time Madame Bricard emerges from her hatbox, she makes an adverse comment, condemns an unfortunate fabric or suddenly opts for a daring color." Precisely one color, lilac —her favorite of hers—, and a print, the leopard print —which she wore before anyone else—, are her most visible contributions to the brand, which has not stopped to remember her Three examples: in 1954 Dior designed a mauve silk two-piece in her honor; in 1997 Galliano made a tulle evening dress in that color. And in 2001, make-up artist Tyen launched a lipstick in... lilac, of course.
This season it is Peter Philips who evokes it with a makeup line and a perfume from La Collection Privée. His image, the actress Anya Taylor-Joy, "a contemporary Mitzah", says the artistic director of Dior makeup, who with this collection pays "tribute to beauty" and, as Monsieur said, "one of those people, every time rarer, that make elegance their only reason for being”.
