In the Eyes of Gaelle Duval - Seconde d’Atelier Dior

In her fingers, in her eyes, the craft has been there since her childhood. A professional diploma, a technical degree in fashion and a trainee contract, the following years were merely an extension of a passion. “As a little girl, I used to make clothes for my dolls. A piece of fabric and an elastic band would become a petticoat for my cuddly toy.” In 2015, she joined Dior as a part-time worker in Madame Jacqueline's Flou atelier. A Flou hand? “It's poetry added to rigour.” This season, we encounter the same grace in these floating models. "The Flou is all about sensitivity at its very core.” It requires, beyond dexterity, a particular intuition: “Muslin is volatile, it flies out of hand. Tailoring is much more docile. The difficulty lies in taming the fabrics and letting them speak for themselves. Letting them fall freely.”

For Spring-Summer 2024, 12 models out of 59 were created in this atelier, where a feathered bustier "in the blink of an eye" sets the tone. On the table, a panel of tulle is tickled by feathers, but black this time. “Each one is sewn one by one. The cloak flies."

Then there is the moiré, “a hand-worked flaw in a play of light. It doesn't like humidity. We iron it dry. It's unforgiving. Swelling on one side (crosswise), and stiff on the other (selvedgewise), the flaw morphs into a sheath requiring over 500 hours of work. What I like is building, wedging and making the canvas. I'm a bit of a Swiss Army knife,” Gaelle adds.

“I can cut, make a pattern, it's almost a form of meditation. You concentrate, your brain escapes, it's a supple, rounded gesture." Madame Jacqueline is standing in front of her, the Première, who will be retiring in July. The countdown begins on the 150th day, when each day she takes a centimetre off her tape measure. “Madame Jacqueline has taught me so much. I learned to be confident from her. Haute Couture is all about precision. When my thread makes knots, I know it's because I'm tense, so I leave it and come back later.”