Highly significant & identifiable historic fashion decades have shaped the 20th century in a way that continues to inspire and influence today’s contemporary generations, fashion movements, brands and designers.
This 4-session course will cover the twentieth century historic period ranging from the end of the second World War to the end of the 1970’s focusing on the following questions:
- Why are these 3 decades considered to be major milestones in the history of Fashion?
- Who were the main iconic individual designers? Why & how did they mark their era?
- How do their designs resonate with “l’Air du Temps” and what do they say about that time?
Objectives
These fundamental questions will be addressed to provide an understanding of the fashion periods examined by this course. You will be given keys to understand these highly significant & identifiable historic fashion periods that shaped the later part of 20th century.
Conjointly, this decryption will help you to understand why these decades still inspire and influence today’s contemporary fashion.
You will understand how social and cultural events influence what designers create, what we wear and therefore how fashion is shaped by these external factors. You will discover and explore how fashion is elaborated by both youth cultural movements (“bubble up” effect) and visionary artistic designers (“trickle down” effect) and understand why they leave a substantial imprint on the clothing industry.
This course will also allow you to identify and describe a selected group of major fashion talents, Couturiers and Designers, that have become prominent figures amongst these twentieth century decades.
Program
Module #1 – The Big (historical) Picture
- Introductory elements – having the keys to contextualize an historical fashion period
- Grasping the overall historical timeline from Worth to 2020
Module #2 – The Golden Age of Couture (1950’s)
- From 1947 and the birth of the Dior’s New Look to Pierre Balmain’s “Jolie Madame”
Module #3 – Youth revolution, futurism and the birth of Ready-To-Wear (1960’s)
- From the swinging sixties, space age to flower power.
- Yves Saint Laurent Rive Gauche, Pierre Cardin, André Courrèges, Paco Rabanne to Mary Quant
Module #4 – The rise of Fashion Designer Power & Street Style (1970’s)
- Street, youth culture & music influences: the hippie movement, Glam rock, Punk & Disco
- From Biba to Vivienne Westwood & Chloé, Givenchy & Céline.
- Concluding Quiz - course wrap up highlighting the main takeaways
Certificate
At the end of the program, a certificate of participation in the Summer School is issued to participants who have attended all courses
