The Couture Superstar: How Thierry Mugler Transformed Fashion

NEWS | by Marine POYER | January 24, 2022

Thierry Mugler au vernissage de l'exposition «Thierry Mugler: Couturissime» au Musée des Arts Décoratifs à Paris, le 28 septembre 2021.

The famed designer ignited the French scene in the 80s and 90s, leaving it forever changed. Manfred Thierry Mugler passed away on Sunday, January 23, 2022, at the age of 73. A look back at his rich and innovative career.

Nothing in his childhood seemed to predispose Manfred Thierry Mugler to a job in styling. Nonetheless a fierce enthusiast of classical dance, the Strasbourg native joined the Ballet du Rhin in 1962, when he was 14. Though dance would always hold a special place in the designer's heart, he would abandon it after a few years to study architecture at Strasbourg's Art Décoratifs, moving to Paris at just 21. With a keen sense of style, it only seemed natural for him to work as a stylist, freelance at first and collaborating with the likes of Cacharel and Dorothée Bis, before he began to create pieces of his own. After a first line entitled "Café de Paris," he first signed his creations as Thierry Mugler in 1974.

Unique silhouettes

With a healthy dose of futurism, a pinch of S&M, and an unparalleled adoration for feminine curves and glamor, (Manfred) Thierry Mugler's designs stood out from the start in fashion's inner circles, where fluid aesthetics were having a moment. With his gaze fixed firmly on what lay ahead, Mugler still paid tribute to the past and sought inspiration in it, producing perfectly-tailored pieces befitting of a Hitchcock heroine. Passionate about nature, he regularly sought respite and fresh air away from the city, and if he described humankind as "the most beautiful animal on earth," his collections speak to snake's skins and wasp-waists. But women were never constrained in Mugler's work — indeed, they were like characters fresh out of the great science-fiction masterpieces, and the clothes testified to their independence. At a time in which women were carving out a new place for themselves in society and the job market, Mugler presented a new way to appropriate their own images and to become what they wanted to be. And it worked. Mugler's designers were hailed for their avant-gardism, and the Chambre syndicale de la Couture invited him to present his collections at Couture week beginning in 1992. The timeless aura so particular to Mugler has been back in vogue more recently, with fashion icons from Kim Kardashian to Cardi B. opting to sport his creations on red carpets all over the world.

Futurist Materials

Well before On Aura Tout Vu and decades after Corrèges and Paco Rabanne, unexpected materials are at the heart of Mugler's collections. PVC, feathers, lace, rubber, varnished or embossed leather, metal, crystals, even seashells — nothing was too out-of-the-box to light up the creator's vivid imagination, and his workshops were regularly on the hunt for new tools and methods to work with unusual materials. Still today under Casey Cadwallader's Creative Direction, inaugurated in 2018, this legacy remains.

Innovative Perfumes

A jack-of-all-spades with inveterate flair, Manfred Thierry Mugler also had the Midas touch in the realm of beauty. In 1992, the designer presented his first fragrance, Angel. The juice — the first "gourmand oriental" to hit the market — blended notes of praline, vanilla, and patchouli, making it a real surprise in the ultra-floral perfume world of the day. Angel was no overnight success, but rather the fruit of a long labor of research. In an interview given in 1979, the creator had already begun dreaming up a fragrance of his own: "I want to make a fragrance that's so delicious you'll want to eat it," he said. And he pulled it off: along with the unique packaging (the star-shaped bottle, a feat of technique, took two years to design at the Brosse glass workshops), the juice signed by Olivier Cresp quickly became a must-have and reshuffled the perfume world's deck for good. Still a best-seller to this day, it was followed by other scents, from Alien to Womanity.

Grandiose Fashion Shows

Last October, Balmain was making fashion press headlines after its show at the Scène Musicale. It was a rarity in the small world of fashion, especially in the midst of a pandemic, but it wasn't exactly a novelty. Always ready to shake things up, Mugler had already revolutionized the format of the standard catwalk in the 1980s. The first game-changer took place in 1984 at the presentation of the Fall-Winter collection "Les Anges de l'Hiver." Unveiled at Paris' famous Zénith venue to a bevy of journalists and buyers invited by the label, along with spectators who had purchased their own tickets, the show was sponsored by Shiseido, Adidas, and Renaut (a first at the time), and featured 60 models and 350 designs. This operatic fashion show, imagined from A to Z by the couturier himself, would be followed by more like it. In 1995, for example, in honor of the label's twentieth anniversary, at the Cirque d'Hiver.

An exciting career

From the very beginning, Mugler put his talent to good use in service of the stars surrounding him. Adored by supermodels like Jerry Hall, he designed a number of costumes for stars like David Bowie from 1979 onwards. Ten years later, he designed Mylène Farmer's wardrobe for her "Tour 89". The 90s were just as fast-paced, seeing collaborations on George Michael's clip "Too Funky," the latter still glowing from "Freedom 90's." His departure from the label he founded, in 2002, didn't slow down his dreams in showbiz: in 2009, he worked with Beyoncé for her "I am..." tour. Along with the costumes, he also participated in the tour's creative direction and choreography. All his life, Mugler remained fascinated by the movement of the human body — directing his own fashion shows from the very beginning, it was in 2013 that he created the revue "Mugler Follies" for the Comédia Theater in Paris. From 2014 to 2016, his star would shine in Berlin, where he staged "The Wyld" at Friedrichstadt-Palast, before taking off for London in 2019, to design the costumes and take on the creative direction of the ballet "McGregor + Mugler."