The Hilfiger Factor and the Flexible Commercial World of Couture

8

The Hilfiger Factor and

the Flexible Commercial

World of Couture

1

Lou Taylor

Introduction

All ‘things’ carry within them a weight of cultural complexities, including
the products of the couture industry, whose meanings are centred specifically
on overt notions of elitism. The cultural power of couture clothing and
accessories remains so strong that it now impacts on the style of clothing at
more market levels than ever before. All around the world, a shoe is just a
shoe, a perfume just a perfume, until magically transformed by a ‘designer’
logo or house style into a symbol of global sophistication. The business of
couture is now so successful that it penetrates right through the global fashion
market place.
Business and couture have always been twinned in close partnership, though
the economics behind the great couture salons have always been carefully
secreted behind the presentational glamour of seasonal fashion shows. Indeed
our knowledge of the past and present of the haute couture industry, with
some notable exceptions,^2 is largely based on a fiction of consisting only of
the story of the designing and making of glorious garments. This revisionist
history of couture is manipulative, strategic and cynical. It deliberately leaves

1. All translations from French are by the author. Thanks for advice from Claire Wilcox
   and Amy de la Haye.


2. Steele, V., Paris Fashions – a cultural history, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1988;
   Coleman, E.A., The Opulent Era, fashions of Worth, Doucert and Pingat, London: Thames
   and Hudson,1989; Bertin, C., Paris ‘a la Mode – a voyage of discovery, London: Gollancz,1956.