51 Facts About Pierre Cardin

Pierre Cardin, born Pietro Costante Cardin, was an Italian-born naturalised-French fashion designer.

Pierre Cardin is known for what were his avant-garde style and Space Age designs.

Pierre Cardin preferred geometric shapes and motifs, often ignoring the female form.

Pierre Cardin founded his fashion house in 1950 and introduced the "bubble dress" in 1954.

Pierre Cardin was designated a UNESCO Goodwill Ambassador in 1991, and a United Nations FAO Goodwill Ambassador in 2009.

Pierre Cardin was born near Treviso in northern Italy, the son of Maria Montagner and Alessandro Pierre Cardin.

Pierre Cardin's parents were wealthy wine merchants, but lost their fortune in World War I To escape the blackshirts they left Italy and settled in Saint-Etienne, France in 1924 along with his ten siblings.

Pierre Cardin's father wanted him to study architecture, but from childhood he was interested in dressmaking and at age fourteen apprenticed with Saint-Etienne tailor Louis Bompuis.

Pierre Cardin worked with the fashion house of Paquin, then Elsa Schiaparelli, until he became head of Christian Dior's tailleure atelier in 1947, but was denied work at Balenciaga.

Pierre Cardin's career was launched when he designed about 30 of the costumes for a masquerade ball in Venice, hosted by Carlos de Beistegui in 1951.

Pierre Cardin inaugurated his haute couture output in 1953 with his first collection of women's clothing and became a member of the Chambre Syndicale, a French association of haute couture designers.

Pierre Cardin's tailoring ability was expressed in three different suit styles, all high-waisted.

Pierre Cardin was the first couturier to turn to Japan as a high fashion market when he travelled there in 1957, and it was in Japan that he would discover one of his favorite models and muses, Hiroko Matsumoto, known professionally as Hiroko, whom the public would associate with Pierre Cardin through much of the 1960s.

Pierre Cardin began to display at this time design elements that would become characteristic of his work for years to come.

Pierre Cardin presented his first women's ready-to-wear collection in 1959.

In early 1960, Pierre Cardin showed a full menswear line for the first time.

Pierre Cardin's hems stayed mostly at the knee for daywear but were lengthened by several inches for fall of 1962, giving an even more thirties-like appearance.

Footwear was often an ankle-high boot style that came to be associated with Pierre Cardin, designed to maintain a clean line while concealing the socks.

Pierre Cardin resigned from the Chambre Syndicale in 1966 and began showing his collections in his own venue.

Pierre Cardin designed uniforms for Pakistan International Airlines, which were introduced from 1966 to 1971 and became an instant hit.

Pierre Cardin had entered his Space Age phase by 1966, as had much of the rest of the fashion world following Andre Courreges's landmark 1964 and '65 collections and the widespread influence of Britain's Mod culture.

Pierre Cardin was the leading advocate of cutouts and prominent zippers as those details peaked among designers in 1966.

Pierre Cardin's cutouts included bare midriffs overlain with geometric shapes.

Pierre Cardin favored geometric diamond shapes, jackets that fell to a low triangular peak at the bottom of the front closure, T-bar cutout necklines, metal neck rings anchoring shift dresses, and the large-scale targets, circles, and triangles that were popular at the time across simple A-line shift minidresses.

Pierre Cardin made his penchant for scalloped edges fit the new geometric mode by making it prominent and oversized on the hem or the leading edge of asymmetric jacket closures that often fastened on the far side, as Cardin had long preferred, but now were closed with tabs.

Pierre Cardin adapted his love of asymmetric hems, earlier a part of his 1930s look, to the new Space Age period by showing hemlines that were shorter on one side than the other, sometimes called a tilted hem, seen especially on evening dresses; miniskirts longer in the front than in the back; skirts consisting of strips, panels, and loops of fabric of various lengths and widths, some petal-like; pleated skirts with fluted hems that curled up and down; and other unusual forms.

Pierre Cardin was one of a small group of designers who remained enamored of futuristic Space Age looks for several more years.

Pierre Cardin's work was noted for including a variety of lengths from 1967 on, particularly his characteristic asymmetric hems, while keeping it all futuristic-looking.

Pierre Cardin continued with his shaped, fitted, wide-lapelled, wide-tied, flared-leg suits, plus lots of zippers and turtlenecks for more casual clothes.

Pierre Cardin used vinyl and other forms of plastic liberally.

Pierre Cardin showed the thigh- or hip-high leather or vinyl stretch boots that were popular with designers at the end of the sixties, Pierre Cardin's often in shiny black and paired with his Space Age-looking geometric minidresses and turtlenecks.

Pierre Cardin finally showed women's trousers in 1968, initially as part of his unisex clothes, an important trend of this enlightened era.

Pierre Cardin continued to include miniskirts among his other lengths.

Pierre Cardin was the first to combine the "mini" and the "maxi" skirts of the 1970s by introducing a new hemline that had long pom-pom panels or fringes.

Pierre Cardin was the first to combine extremely short and ankle-length pieces.

Pierre Cardin made dresses with slits and batwing sleeves with novel dimensions and mixed circular movement and gypsy skirts with structured tops.

Pierre Cardin became an icon for starting this popular fashion movement of the early 1970s.

Pierre Cardin resigned from the Chambre Syndicale in 1966 and began showing his collections in his own venue.

Pierre Cardin designed uniforms for Pakistan International Airlines, which were introduced from 1966 to 1971 and became an instant hit.

In 1971, Pierre Cardin redesigned the barong tagalog, a national costume of the Philippines, by opening the front, removing the cuffs that needed cufflinks, flaring the sleeves, and minimizing the embroidery.

In 1975, Pierre Cardin opened his first furniture boutique on the Rue du Faubourg Saint-Honore.

Pierre Cardin was a member of the Chambre Syndicale de la Haute Couture et du Pret-a-Porter from 1953 to 1993.

In 1979, Pierre Cardin was appointed a consultant to China's agency for trade in textiles, and in March of that year, he became the first Western designer to present a fashion show in China in many decades.

Pierre Cardin introduced Maxim's to Beijing in 1983, where it was among the first international brands to operate in mainland China and became an enduring cultural landmark.

Pierre Cardin used his name as a brand, initially a prestigious fashion brand, then in the 1960s extended successfully into perfumes and cosmetics.

However, the Pierre Cardin name was still very profitable, although the indiscriminate licensing approach was considered a failure.

Pierre Cardin entered industrial design by developing thirteen basic design "themes" that would be applied to various products, each consistently recognizable and carrying his name and logo.

The Pierre Cardin Javelins came with the designer's emblems on the front fenders and had a limited selection of exterior colors to coordinate with the special interiors.

However, 12 Pierre Cardin optioned cars were special ordered in Midnight Black paint.

Pierre Cardin self-identified as being mostly gay, but in the 1960s he had a four-year relationship with actress Jeanne Moreau.

Pierre Cardin died on 29 December 2020, at the American Hospital of Paris, in Neuilly-sur-Seine, at the age of 98.