André Courrèges, the French couturier and industry legend, passed away yesterday at the age of 92 after a long battle with Parkinson’s disease. As the founder and catalyst of the space-age fashion movement in the ’60s, Courrèges was one of fashion’s most revolutionary figures, responsible for liberating women from the strict, über-feminine silhouettes of the ’50s in favor of miniskirts, peekaboo A-line dresses, and his infamous white ankle boots.
His career began in 1950 at Balenciaga, where he worked under the house’s founder for 11 years. It was at Balenciaga where he also met Coqueline Barrière, his wife and creative collaborator for the rest of his life. (The “AC” in the brand’s logo actually stands for “André and Coqueline,” not “André Courrèges.”) Together, they founded the Courrèges haute couture maison in 1961, expanding into ready-to-wear several years later. By 1965, Courrèges had risen to international fame for his forward-thinking modern designs.
The breadth of Courrèges’s contributions to fashion is immense. Together with his contemporaries Paco Rabanne and Pierre Cardin, he changed the look of the ’60s, turning boxy shapes, thigh-grazing lengths, and bold accessories into must-haves for go-go girls of the era. He is credited as the founder of the miniskirt (an accolade he shares with Mary Quant), though he was also one of the first designers to put women in pants and utilize bodysuits as a “second skin.” He may also be the only designer to dress both Jacqueline Kennedy and Miley Cyrus—the former having been a dedicated client in the ’60s, along with Catherine Deneuve, Brigitte Bardot, and Françoise Hardy, while the latter wore several Courrèges pieces to host MTV’s Video Music Awards in 2015.
In addition to designing clothing, Courrèges also produced iconic accessories and perfumes, all part of his vision for a new modern lifestyle. Though he left his namesake brand in the ’90s, he continued to watch over it from his home in Neuilly-sur-Seine, France. Today, his legacy is being carried on by creative directors Sebastien Vaillant and Arnaud Meyer, who presented their first collection for the brand for Spring 2016. Co-presidents of Courrèges, Frédéric Torloting and Jacques Bungert released the below statement, translated from French: “All his life, André Courrèges, with Coqueline, continued to advance, invent, and stay ahead of the curve: [He was] a visionary designer who saw, in advance, what the 21st century would be and who believed in progress. This is what makes Courrèges so modern today. We are thinking of his family, with whom we are very close.”
Relive Courrèges’s legacy in the pages of Vogue here.