Rose Bertin, the creator of Haute Couture (2/2)

2024-02-20T04:11:00.987Z

Highlights: Rose Bertin is received twice a week at Versailles in the queen's interior offices. Together, Rose and Marie-Antoinette invented styles, like…the pouf! It is a horsehair cushion which can be up to 1.50 meters high on which hair is glued to create spectacular hairstyles. During the French Revolution, Rose Bertin preferred to go into exile and follow her refugee clients to foreign courts. It was Rose's bonnets that the queen wore in her cell in the Conciergerie during her trial.

Listen to the rest of Rose Bertin's story, told by Virginie Girod. Born into a modest family in Picardy, she became the creator of Marie-Antoinette’s “looks”. Thanks to her, the queen is a true fashion icon...much to the despair of France's finances. Rose Bertin is received twice a week at Versailles in the queen's interior offices. A privilege that very few courtiers have at court! Together, Rose and Marie-Antoinette invented styles, like…the pouf! It is a horsehair cushion which can be up to 1.50 meters high on which hair is glued to create spectacular hairstyles. Rose Bertin also designs accessories to dress them. In total, Marie-Antoinette spends around 90,000 pounds per year in the designer's boutique, or around 1 million 30,000 euros today. In the 1780s, Rose Bertin was a rich woman who was heavily criticized. The people are roaring. Marie-Antoinette is accused of emptying the state coffers to fill the pockets of her fashion merchant. Her detractors give the queen a new nickname: “madame deficit”! During the French Revolution, Rose Bertin preferred to go into exile and follow her refugee clients to foreign courts. However, she continued to supply Marie-Antoinette: it was Rose's bonnets that the queen wore in her cell in the Conciergerie during her trial. At the end of the Terror, the designer returned to her quarters in Paris, but she had gone out of fashion... An unpublished story that Virginie Girod also tells you in the pages of Madame Figaro, on newsstands on February 23. https://madame.lefigaro.fr Topics covered: haute couture, Versailles, Marie-Antoinette, French revolution