“Everything I lived, I wrote it down,
she summed up when her memoirs were released in 2007
.
My life was my diary.
Experienced in
"living without vertigo, without asking questions and far beyond her means, in the luxury of famous people",
Janie Samet, who spent twenty-five years writing in the style pages of Le Figaro, jumped
"d 'one plane to another, from one evening dress to another...'
, sat in the front row of the parades, where nothing escaped his gaze, nor his pen.
While she was only a trainee at L'
Écho d'Oran,
she met a young 18-year-old designer during a competition organized by the International Wool Secretariat.
Her name?
Yves Saint Laurent.
She is the first to interview him.
“
He won the first prize with the sketch of a small dinner dress that will be made in the workshops of Hubert de Givenchy
, she said in 2014.
In fact a non-event for Paris, but our young man being from Oran, L'Écho d'Oran sent the trainee that I was in this newspaper to interview the future great man.
Two bruises paralyzed with shyness met that day.
She will follow him until his farewell in 2002.
With Hubert de Givenchy, in his studio.
LE FIGARO
In 1957, she joined
L'Aurore.
There she created the section “Kisses from London by Janie Samet”, where she tells what she observes of “
swinging London
”.
In 1979, she joined
Le Figaro
in the fashion section, as deputy editor-in-chief.
His column “The glance of Janie Samet” was born the same year.
She invented fashion criticism as we know it today.
“
Sewing is my permanent battleground there with tighter attacks four times a year during collections that we are the only French daily to report on a daily basis.
Not a parade started without her.
His pen, sincere and sharp, made the pages of
Le Figaro
a meeting place for big bosses, designers and, of course, readers, amateurs or connoisseurs.
She revealed many talents there: Jean Paul Gaultier, Thierry Mugler and Christian Lacroix, who started at Patou before creating his own label.
In 1987, the ultimate consecration, she received an Oscar for fashion, that of the best French or foreign daily journalist.
The only one ever awarded.
“
Because it relates fashion events, parties and balls with joy and familiarity to our readers, it is called 'le champagne du Figaro',
we read in our columns.
Janie Samet has the blondness, and the sparkle in the corner of her eyes.
But it is the professional acuity of her gaze that has just been rewarded with the Oscar for best daily journalist, awarded during the evening at the Opera organized on Wednesday evening by the Chambre Syndicale de la Haute Couture
.
In 2007, she received from the hands of Pierre Cardin the insignia of officer of the Order of Arts and Letters LE FIGARO
In 2004, she left her post.
Without stopping to write: two years later, she published her memoirs, “
Chère Haute Couture
”, 300 pages in which she remembers her encounters with Gianni Versace, Karl Lagerfeld, Yves Saint Laurent of course, and so many others.
In 2007, she received from the hands of Pierre Cardin the insignia of officer of the Order of Arts and Letters.
A few years ago, the one who had toured the world had settled in Cannes.
She died this morning at age 91.
