An international exhibition from the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, which highlights the ‘the Master’ of haute couture, Cristóbal Balenciaga.
The exhibition focuses on the glory days of the 1950s and 1960s, when his unparalleled creativity revolutionised fashion. Balenciaga’s daring, architectural lines, free of the restrictions of the body, still influence fashion today, and the exhibition also shows garments by more recent designers who have continued in the footsteps of the master, such as Hubert de Givenchy, Yohij Yamamoto, Iris Van Herpen, and Hussein Chalayan.

The Spanish-born fashion designer Cristóbal Balenciaga designed exclusive, tailored clothing of the highest quality for the world’s fashion elite from the 1930s to the 1960s. The Victoria and Albert Museum’s Balenciaga: Shaping Fashion exhibition focuses on the glory days of the 1950s and 1960s, when Balenciaga was at the forefront of fashion development and introduced innovations such as the ‘sack’ dress, ‘baby doll’ cut, balloon skirt, and tunics.

The exhibition presents work in the studio, the construction of the garments, and the fashionable clients who wore his designs. Alongside a great number of original garments from the Victoria and Albert Museum’s collections and international loans, couture­ garments by more recent designers who have continued to work in Balenciaga’s spirit are shown. These include Yves Saint Laurent, Hubert de Givenchy, Oscar de la Renta, Calvin Klein, Yohij Yamamoto, Hussein Chalayan, Rei Kawakubo, Iris Van Herpen, and others.