London's V&A Will Remix 'Christian Dior: Designer of Dreams Exhibition' Opening Feb. 2, 2019

London's V&A museum will open a blockbuster fashion exhibition in 2019 focused on Christian Dior's fascination with British culture. Scheduled to be the biggest fashion exhibition since it hosted Alexander McQueen's 'Savage Beauty', the exhibition will examine the total expanse of the House of Dior from 1947 to the present. 

Fashionistas already know about the Christian Dior: Designer of Dreams exhibition held at the Museum of Decorative Arts in Paris from summer 2017 until January 2018. The V&A will remix and reimagine the Paris show, surely highlighting the Dior dress worn by Princess Margaret for her 21st birthday celebration. The dress traveled to Paris on loan from the Museum of London, the V&A said. 

The exhibition will also explore Dior's “spectacular fashion shows staged in the UK’s most luxurious stately homes”. The famous fashion designers said "There is no other country in the world, besides my own, whose way of life I like so much."

"In 1947, Christian Dior changed the face of fashion with his 'New Look,' which redefined the female silhouette and reinvigorated the post-war Parisian fashion industry," says Oriole Cullen, a fashion and textiles curator at the V&A. "The influence of Christian Dior’s design was all-pervasive and helped to define an era. In their own individual ways, each of the House’s successive artistic directors have referenced and reinterpreted Dior’s own designs and continued the legacy of the founder, ensuring that the House of Christian Dior is at the forefront of fashion today. More than 70 years after its founding, the V&A’s exhibition will celebrate the enduring influence of the House of Dior and uncover Dior’s relationship with Britain."

Within the context of current Dior creative director Maria Grazia Chiuri's longstanding commitment to feminism, we must note that many cultural anthropologists and students of feminism believe that Dior's silhouettes and haute couture attitudes actually set back women's rights which were on the move because of women's participation in the WWII war effort. 

Christian Dior: Designer of Dreams will open from 2nd February – 14th July 2019 at the V&A Museum. Tickets go on sale in fall 2018.