He was a revolutionary, an avant-garde and a provocateur, and
his name already has a prominent place in the history of fashion.
Like Yves Saint Laurent, Christian Dior, Karl Lagerfeld and Gianni Versace,
Paco Rabanne burst onto the catwalk world with his metallic and futuristic dresses
that made his name go global when globalization did not yet exist.
Her beginnings in fashion were accessories.
He made handmade buttons and embroidery without thread or needle
that was bought by the brands of the moment at the beginning of the 60s: Balenciaga, Nina Ricci, Pierre Cardin, Courrèges and Givenchy.
But Paco Rabanne was up for more and he knew it.
Her first collection was presented
in 1966,
at the prestigious Parisian Georges V hotel. It was called Manifesto and there were
12 dresses made with metal plates and discs of cellulose acetate
that caused a sensation: they were almost impossible to wear but no one could stop looking at them.
Since then, his genius has been in the crosshairs of fashion editors, prestigious photographers and celebrities who were dying to wear his iconic designs.
His client list was the envy of every designer: Brigitte Bardot, Jane Birkin, Audrey Hepburn and Elizabeth Taylor
had the luxury of wearing an authentic Rabanne at least once in his life.
It is that no woman in the 60s and 70s could be oblivious to her creative proposal that included everything from shiny leather fabrics, papers and aluminum.
No one had ever dared so much.
Paco Rabanne tests the chocolate with which he made a dress, in Paris.
Photo Reuters
The Spanish Paco Rabanne, who inherited his passion for fashion from his mother who was a seamstress for Cristobal Balenciaga,
made the most expensive dress in history, in gold and diamonds.
It was for the actress Françoise Hardy: the model weighed 9 kilos and
had 1,000 gold plates.
He also
created the futuristic costume that Jane Fonda wore in the film Barbarella.
On the catwalk, she dazzled with her metallic, very short dresses, many of which left the skin exposed.
Coco Chanel, no less, dubbed him “the metallurgist of fashion”.
Over
time, Francisco Rabaneda y Cuervo (his real name) experimented with other materials and made designs in nylon and mother-of-pearl.
Nothing matched his futuristic designs.
And nothing was ever the same at his brand after
his retirement from couture in 1999.
Paco Rabanne, at the parade of one of his collections in Moscow.
His
successors tried to keep his style alive in the collections they presented, but
his name ended up related to the world of fragrances
manufactured by the Spanish group Puig, rather than to the red carpets and fashion editions in the magazines that idolized him so much. and pages they gave him when he was at the top of his career.
Fashion was not the only thing that crossed the life of Paco Rabanne.
He has always developed a mystical personality that led him to make predictions (failed but predictions nonetheless), write books and even cause a scandal.
In thousands of interviews with him, he has said that he was an alien, that he met Jesus, that he killed Tutankhamen, and that he was nearly 75,000 years old.
In the midst of all this,
he received great awards for his unique and unforgettable talent, creativity and daring.
He died in Paris, he was 88 years old.
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Paco Rabanne, a fashion icon and also recognized for his perfumes, has died
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