fashion for the few

Casting a spell in Paris

PARIS (AFP) - Only a handful of women in the world can afford it, and designers make little if any money from it, but haute couture never fails to cast a magic spell over the realm of fashion.

Chanel Haute Couture - AW 2009-2010

Starting today, no fewer than 20 houses will be sending out their latest one-off creations over three days of exclusive haute couture shows that get underway in the French capital.

"An haute couture dress is never expensive enough," said fashion industry consultant Donald Potard, and to the few hundred women who can indulge themselves, the appeal of a one-of-a-kind creation is undeniable.

A unique creation from a young designer is never less than 15,000 euros (20,000 dollars); double that figure for something from a big-name house. Wedding dresses can go for 120,000 euros or more.

Haute couture exists only in Paris, where it is a legally protected appellation subject to strict criteria such as the amount of work carried out by hand, the limited number of pieces and the size of a house's workforce.

Every six months, haute couture houses get together to decide who can join their ranks. While the carefully choreographed shows are magnets for the fashion press, many buyers -- from all corners of the world, with a significant number from Asia and the Middle East -- prefer to be discreet.

At salons such as Jean Paul Gaultier's elegant quarters in Paris, clients have their own personal mannequin on which their chosen designs can be painstakingly made. The final product can take hundreds of hours to complete.

Few in number, buyers of haute couture nevertheless vary in age and background. "Don't think they are all chic elderly ladies," says luxury industry consultant Jean-Jacques Picart.

Some details on a design can be altered -- sleeves added, for instance, or a hemline changed. But Claude Mialaud, director of haute couture at Jean Paul Gaultier says employees are duty-bound to reveal if an haute couture dress has been sold to someone else. "There are women," she says, "who cannot risk finding themselves meeting someone else in the same dress."

by Gersende Rambourg