Lou Claverie for Paquin. Blue swing coat. Original fashion design. Paris, Spring-Summer 1952

Fashion design for a woman's coat

Given by the House of Worth

This group of designs was originally archived as being from 1954-55. The following assessment was made by Daniel Milford-Cottam, July 2013:

My conclusion is that this group of 26 designs drawn up by the same artist (E.22792 to 22817-1957), although identified as 1954-55, was designed slightly earlier by Lou Claverie (who worked at Paquin from 1949 to 1953) rather than Alan Graham, who designed the last few collections for Paquin before the house closed on 1 July 1956. The appointment by Paquin of a young, relatively unknown American designer, rather than someone from Europe, was seen as an unusual choice at the time. There is a precedent for the mistake - at least one group of designs originally archived as by Alan Graham from 1955-56 included a design for a distinctive suit photographed and published in 1951. Due to the distinctive artwork of the designs, this made it possible to identify a whole group of designs from Spring 1951 that had been mis-identified. This led to a closer examination of other designs linked to Alan Graham, particularly as some of the styles did not seem as up-to-date as might be expected for their associated years.

Each season, the designs for that season's collection would have been drawn up for clients to look through and pick out which outfits they wished to consider purchasing. The unique nature of the drawing style has enabled this group of 26 designs - incidentally, reflecting a realistic number and range of styles for a single season's collection - to be singled out. The same figure template was used for most of the designs, with a distinctive detail of disembodied lips that only this group of designs features.

They were originally archived as from 1954-55. However, the group of designs linked to Autumn-Winter 1953-4 shows a fashionable straighter, slimmer silhouette. The extremely nipped-in waists, full skirts, and tight pencil skirt silhouettes seen here are more typical of a year or two previously. While this will need further research to try and conclusively verify, my feeling is that these 26 designs are probably from the Autumn-Winter 1951-2 or Spring 1952 collection, both of which previously appeared to be missing from the earlier collection chronology. Although Spring 1953 also appears to be missing, I suspect these designs are from Spring 1952.

Claverie's design vocabulary included cleverly cut swing coats which were often intricately seamed with unusual shoulder-and-sleeve constructions. Six of the designs in this group include such coats. Although it's possible that Alan Graham continued designing such coats, the silhouettes of these coats would have seemed slightly dated by late 1954, when a straighter silhouette was beginning to be fashionable. The dresses, coats and suits designed by Alan Graham for Autumn-Winter 1953-4 are significantly simpler and more straightforward in their design, which contrasts with the elaborate detailing and complexity in many of these outfits. Such detail is more typical of Parisian than American fashion design.

Another Claverie trademark was the wittty, bilingual names of many of his designs, including "Sex Appeal" (for a mid-1950 evening gown), "Chi-Chi," "Gossip", "George Sand", and "Enfant Gâté". Some of the designs in this group have names such as "Sweet Peas," "Modeste," and "Valentin," which is definitely in the Claverie vein. Although Alan Graham's first collection for Autumn-Winter 1953-4 also included named designs, they are in a more direct vein, such as "Dagobert," "Hector," and "Dinah".

Taking all this into consideration, I feel reasonably confident in re-attributing these designs to Lou Claverie, probably from Spring 1952.

- Daniel Milford-Cottam, 29 July 2013.

On 31 July 2013, Dominique Sirop confirmed the above assessment, clarifying that these designs are indeed by Claverie for the Spring 1952 collection.

E.22812-1957