Thierry Mugler, the couturier de la Due, died at the age of 73<

French fashion is losing one of its giants on the eve of Parisian haute couture week. Thierry Mugler, who reigned over the fashion of the 1980s and continued to delight international stars with his spectacular outfits with marked silhouettes, died on January 23 at the age of 73 of "natural death", announced his attaché of press at AFP.

"We have the immense sadness to inform you of the death of Mr. Manfred Thierry Mugler", is it also written in a press release published on the Facebook account of the creator. "That his soul rests in peace." According to his press officer, the death of the great couturier occurred unexpectedly on Sunday afternoon. He still had plans and was due to announce new collaborations earlier this week, he said.

The Mugler woman, object of fantasies

Born in Strasbourg in December 1948, Mugler was hired at the age of 14 in the ballet corps of the Opéra du Rhin before taking lessons at school decorative arts of the Alsatian capital. He already creates his own clothes from those bought at flea markets. At the age of 20, he moved to Paris in search of a commitment to another corps de ballet. He will have more success with his personal wardrobe. Thierry Mugler very quickly became a freelance stylist and worked for various houses in Paris, London and Milan.

Thierry Mugler created his own Café de Paris label in 1973, before founding the Thierry Mugler company a year later. Its structured and sophisticated silhouettes quickly imposed themselves. The Mugler woman, with accentuated shoulders, plunging necklines and corseted waists, has toured the world, from Jerry Hall to Kim Kardashian.

An object of fantasy, the Mugler woman is an outrage to modesty, a galactic siren, a cybernetic robot, a fantastic animal... She is a hell's angel in her Harley-Davidson bustier or a Marilyn in a guipure sheath flesh pink rubber. Its couture also saw the light of day with recognizable basque suits at first glance.

Pioneer of spectacular fashion shows

A director at heart, he had made an impression by becoming a pioneer, in the 1970s, of spectacular fashion shows. He later embarked on the creation of perfumes, his first feminine model Angel launched in 1992 experiencing great success, until competing for first place in sales with the legendary N°5 by Chanel.

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Mugler, who reigned over the fashion of the 80s, has the show in his blood: for the tenth anniversary of his house, in 1984, he organized the first public fashion presentation in Europe, at the Zenith, in front of 6,000 people , like a rock concert. Tickets were sold for 178 francs (27 euros) each. The parade, placed under the sign of the liturgical, divine and mysticism, took place on a 35-meter podium. As usual, it controls everything from accessories to soundtrack. "My measure is excess", he said.

For the 20th anniversary, the creator chooses the Cirque d'hiver. 75 stars and models, from Naomi Campbell and Jerry Hall to American heiress Patricia Hearst, actress Tippi Hedren and even James Brown in the finale emerging from a giant star to the rhythms of "Sex Machine".

Thierry Mugler, who launched a men's collection in 1978, benefited from a tremendous publicity stunt thanks to the Minister of Culture Jack Lang whose "Mao collar" suit signed by the designer caused a scandal on the benches in 1985 of the National Assembly.

"Detaching yourself from haute couture"

After leaving fashion, the couturier pushed the art of metamorphosis to the point of becoming unrecognizable, body and face, by using to intensive bodybuilding and cosmetic surgery, while engaging in meditation and yoga. "The first emergency was to reclaim my body, exhausted by my years of dancing and sewing, like a rebirth, a way of erasing the past", explained the couturier, claiming "(his) new bodily home", and demanding that he be referred to as "Manfred T. Mugler" henceforth.

"Mugler wanted to break away from the haute couture that corresponded to an elite and show that young people could also wear haute couture and that it could be something other than a dress to go to a chic evening", had to at the time declared Thierry-Maxime Loriot, curator of the exhibition, originally produced by the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts.

From Mugler Folies to MAD

In 2013 and 2014, the couturier wanted to "shake up" the art of the magazine by launching the "Mugler Follies" in a Parisian theater, transformed into a cabaret. Singular dancers from the filiform to the Botero model, ventriloquists, singer, fado singer, acrobats, unpublished strength numbers: he had wanted to set up a magazine for "a long time", "a free art, joy of living and exchange , without a message, where everything is possible", he told AFP at the time.

"I don't really miss fashion", he explained then. "I do a lot more now: architecture, design, setting up a magazine, staging... When I was a designer, It was a daily staging offered to clients. Now it's a narration, a story, shows, films..."

Thierry Mugler retired from fashion in 2002, but today's pop culture icons like Lady Gaga, Beyoncé, Cardi B and Kim Kardashian still wear his archive outfits for special occasions. Thus in September 2021, for the inauguration of the exhibition "Thierry Mugler, Couturissime" at the Museum of Decorative Arts in Paris, the American rapper Cardi B had posed by his side dressed in a spectacular dress with red sequins, topped with feathers. . This exhibition was launched at the end of September, when Fashion Week returned to the parades after being confined during the pandemic. A symbol for the one who was the pioneer of the parade show.

Among the latest photos on her Facebook account, we could see Kim Kardashian, in a metallic outfit and cowbow hat, designed for her for Halloween by the designer.